Leverage
by Evil Cosmic Triplets
Summary: Steve has a bad feeling about taking Danny to the 50th State Fair, but he's probably just being overprotective, and Danny will be heartbroken if they don't go. Sequel #2 to "I'm Keeping the Kid" and take out scenes from "Stolen Memories". Heed warnings inside.
1. A Well Orchestrated Plan

**Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters of this work of fiction, and am not making a profit, monetary or otherwise, though the writing of this.

 **A/N:** This has been in the works for a long time. Much thanks to Irene Claire, and Swifters, for reading through this, asking questions, pointing out errors, and cheer leading. I have been on the fence about how best to post this - as part of the time stamps, or as a separate story, and have finally decided to keep it as a separate story.

 **Warning:** There will be heavy material in this, and some of it will be triggering. There is violence, and child abuse. None of the sexual abuse is explicit, or described in any detail, but it is heavily implied, and as someone who has issues, I am warning those who may have these same types of issues that the second chapter of this might be extremely triggering because of those heavy implications/allusions. I did not write this for sensationalism, and I do not condone the kidnapping or abuse of children. If anything, I want to raise awareness and let people know that they are not alone, and that there is hope.

* * *

When Danny's friend's mother invites Danny, and Steve, to the 50th State Fair, Steve's gut reaction is to say, no. It's the same friend that Steve's almost eighty percent certain is halfway responsible for the mutt that's somehow become Steve's responsibility since it 'followed' Danny home from school a month ago.

Steve hates the fair, almost as much as he hates picking up dog poop in the backyard. Hates any mass gathering of people. It's a recipe for disaster, anyway you look at it, and Steve looks at it in many different ways.

Steve has often used the cover of large gatherings of people to execute, or kidnap, a target. In highly charged events, it's easy to disappear into the crowd, particularly if people are panicking, as often is the case when someone is killed in front of them, and the shooter can't be found, or if a child, or loved one, goes missing.

Sometimes a friend or family member's disappearance won't be noticed until after several crucial minutes, or hours, have passed, making it impossible for police to recover the missing person, because the trail has gone cold.

Fairs, like it or not, are easy pickings for child molesters, pickpockets, and people like Steve, who've been hired to kill high profile people, or kidnap someone.

Unless it's for a job, Steve never willingly attends a parade, or any city-wide event, or a state fair, or an amusement park. There's simply too much potential for mayhem. Too much inherent danger.

The idea of willingly taking Danny to such an event has Steve in a cold sweat. It doesn't help that Danny's holding his hand, looking up at him with ill-contained excitement when Mrs. Uehara asks, practically begging Steve with his eyes.

Kento's giving Steve that same look. His dark eyes filled with hope. Steve knows that he's being more than just a little uncharitable when he wistfully wishes for the days when Danny and Kento were at each other's throats instead of friends. Things had been easier then. Danny hadn't been invited to birthday parties, or picnics, or fairs. Steve hadn't had to vet out the venues ahead of time.

He hates that he's got a reputation as an overprotective parent, but it's better than the alternative of potentially losing Danny, because he hadn't conducted a threat assessment.

Steve feels blindsided, and as though he'll be ruining Danny for life (not that he hasn't already) if he says, no, to going to the state fair on Saturday. His mouth is dry, and his skin feels tight, but he nods, and, for days leading up to the event, he has a series of gruesome nightmares that have him blindly reaching for Danny as the little boy disappears before his eyes, or reaching for the gun that he keeps hidden beneath his pillow, to kill a faceless enemy that's hurt Danny, or Kento. And fuck, when did Steve start caring about other people's kids, too?

Steve has too many enemies to sleep easily. The Hesse brothers come immediately to mind. They've been a thorn in Steve's side for awhile now, always trying to edge him out of jobs, and making it clear that they'd willingly kill him if given the chance. He'd edged them out of a job once, nearly gotten the youngest brother killed in the process, and they'd never gotten over it.

It doesn't help that Steve's heard rumors of the brothers' presence on island for the past couple of weeks. Allegedly, they're here for a high profile killing, Steve doesn't doubt for a second that, given the opportunity, the Hesse brothers, Anton and Victor, won't hesitate to take him out, or to take Danny from him and use the little boy for leverage, or just kill him outright as they'd killed Steve's father when he'd been away on a job. Sometimes he can still hear the sound of the kill shot echoing over the phone.

Saturday dawns bright and clear, and Danny's up before Steve is, eagerly awaiting the day's events. He's poured himself a large bowl of cereal, and only has spilled a little of the milk. He's using a tablespoon, and, wearing a large, cast-off tee-shirt of Steve's as a nightshirt. It looks like he's drowning in the fabric, and it makes him look much younger than he is. It doesn't help that Danny's kneeling on one of the chairs so that he can reach the kitchen table.

The doctors had assured Steve that Danny's height, and his slight weight are more a matter of genetics than a medical issue. Danny wasn't too short, or too skinny. There was, according to the doctors, nothing wrong with the little boy.

Still, Steve worries when Danny won't eat, and that the boy hasn't grown even a part of an inch in the last several months. His Aunt Deb has assured him that growth spurts are exactly that, growth spurts, and that Danny's height and weight are probably genetic traits that he'd gotten from his mother's side of the family, along with his blonde hair, though his blue eyes, and stubborn streak, she claims, come from Steve. According to his Aunt Deb, the McGarretts are not lacking in either of those traits, and though Danny's not exactly his, Steve doesn't correct her on her assumptions of whom Danny got what trait from.

 _Stubborn to a fault,_ was how she'd put it.

"Danny?" Steve scrubs a hand over his face, willing his nerves to subside.

His latest nightmare had featured Danny, floating facedown in the shallow waters of the ocean, dismembered, body bloated almost beyond recognition. Steve forces the image from his mind, and focuses, instead, on the image of the boy, very much alive, in front of him.

Danny's overloaded a spoon with the combination of cheerios, fruit loops, frosted flakes, and cocoa pebbles, that he's poured into his bowl (all cereals that Steve would not have in his cupboard were it not for Chin, Kono, and Deb), and he stuffs it into his mouth with a growl. His cheeks are puffed out like those of that cartoon chipmunk in that movie that Danny likes to watch, the one that Steve can never, for the life of him, even though he's seen it a million times now, remember the name of. There's a dribble of milk running down his chin, and the little boy's smiling at him, his blue eyes sparkling as he crunches the cereal.

The doctors had also told Steve that Danny's behavior was well within the range of normal for a kid his age, who's recently lost a parent.

Danny's pretending to be a tiger again. Aunt Deb had taken Danny to the Honolulu Zoo the other day, and the little boy had been fascinated with the tigers, and the elephants. He'd either walk around with his fingers curled into claws and growl, or stomp his feet and use an arm for a trunk and make a bellowing noise that Steve doubts any elephant has ever made in its lifetime.

According to Aunt Deb, Danny had also 'arrested' another little boy at the zoo for misbehaving. He'd used his shoelaces as makeshift zip ties to secure the boy to the railing, and had read the kid his Miranda rights, something he'd apparently learned while watching some kind of cop show.

Aunt Deb couldn't stop laughing during the telling of the story, but Steve has the feeling that, even though Danny pretends to be a tiger one minute, and a cop the next, he's got a keen sense of right and wrong, and a memory like a steel trap when it comes to cop shows, because, from what Steve _can_ glean between his aunt's peals of laughter as she's retelling the story, is that Danny's actually memorized the Miranda rights as they'd been cited on television. It's more than a little disconcerting.

Aunt Deb, and thankfully the parent of the kid Danny had 'arrested', thought it was cute. Steve finds it rather alarming that the boy he's raising has aspirations of becoming a cop, though he supposes that the same could be said of Danny wanting to become a tiger or an elephant. Chances are that he won't become any of those things, though Danny becoming a cop is far more feasible than his becoming a tiger or an elephant.

"Wan' some c'real?" Danny asks around a mouthful of food, and he pushes the bowl toward Steve. Some of the milk spills over the edge of the bowl. The cereal is practically drowning in milk, and looks about as appetizing as moldy bread.

Stitch, the ragamuffin puppy that followed Danny home from school (cradled in the boy's arms) sits at the boy's feet, tongue lolling, tail thumping the tiled floor as he waits for Danny to 'accidentally' drop some food onto the floor.

Steve blinks at the offered bowl. It's colorful, and the only semi-nutritional elements in it are the cheerios, and the vitamin fortified milk. Steve shakes his head, and smiles his thanks as he tries not to grimace. He wonders if Stitch will eat whatever Danny leaves behind of the breakfast cereal, or if the pup will turn his nose up at it. So far Stitch has not said no to anything even remotely edible. The dog seems to have a bottomless pit for a stomach.

Instead of commenting, or lecturing Danny on the merits of a good, hearty breakfast to start off the day, Steve walks to the counter, tousling Danny's hair on the way there, and grabs a banana. He quickly cuts it up into bite-sized pieces, and slides it onto a plate with a dollop of peanut butter on the side, because, for some reason unfathomable to Steve, Danny won't eat bananas without peanut butter, and he won't eat them unless they are cut in a certain way - sliced sideways, so the pieces are leaning and can make a 'train'. Something that Steve had discovered through much trial and error.

Steve starts his coffee, and slides the plate of bananas and peanut butter onto the table within Danny's reach, and pops some bread into the toaster for his own breakfast. He pulls out strawberries, greek yogurt, and some whey protein from the fridge, and fishes a few more bananas out of the basket, to start on the smoothie for him and Danny. He'll add a tablespoon of honey and a tablespoon of peanut butter for Danny, because the little boy needs all of the calories he can get, even if the doctors say that he's not underweight, they do recommend that Steve encourage Danny to eat.

They've got a long day ahead of them, and Steve has a feeling that he, and Danny, are both going to need as much of an energy boost as they can get. Even though he, Chin, and Kono, have already scoped out the fair, and Steve's got every entrance and exit memorized, along with the entire layout of the place, he still can't shake the feeling that something is going to go wrong.

Kono had told him not to worry, that he was just being an overprotective, paranoid dad. Chin had told him that he needed to stop being a control freak, relax, go for a swim, or go to the shooting range, and not to give Danny a complex by projecting his insecurities, and neuroses, onto the kid.

Both Kono and Chin would be nearby, just in case. Though they'd rolled their eyes when Steve had asked, they hadn't refused to join them at the fair.

"I wanna ride everything, Uncle Steve," Danny says around a sip of his smoothie. He's pushed the bowl of soggy cereal away, done after only three and a half bites (not that Steve is counting), and has eaten half of the banana (the peanut butter's gone), and will probably drink only half of the smoothie (if Steve's lucky).

"What about you?"

Steve takes a sip of his smoothie, and pretends to think about it. He has no plans to go on any of the rides. He's there to keep an eye on Danny, and to make sure that the little boy doesn't get lost, or stolen, or anything else. He reaches across the table, and surreptitiously slips the bowl of soggy cereal beneath the table, and hides a grimace behind his coffee mug when he hears Stitch gulping up the remnants of Danny's breakfast.

"Maybe the swings," Steve says when Danny keeps staring at him, waiting for an answer.

The little boy sighs, and stirs his smoothie with his straw. "But the swings are boring, Uncle Steve."

Steve chuckles, and takes another sip of his smoothie, silently urging Danny to do the same. "I don't know about that," he says. "I enjoyed them when I was a kid." Which is the last time he ever went to any fair, willingly, outside of a job.

"Oh," Danny says, though he doesn't sound convinced that, even as a kid, Steve could enjoy the swings. He does take a sip of his smoothie, though, and Steve counts that as a win.

Danny's done with breakfast after another few sips of the smoothie. He pushes away from the table, turning around in the kitchen doorway to ask permission to leave.

"Thanks for breakfast," Danny shouts from the vicinity of the stairs. Stitch scrambles to follow after his young master, nails slip-sliding on the tile floor as he races after the boy, nearly colliding into the wall as he bounds after Danny.

"Don't forget to brush your teeth," Steve calls out after the boy. The slam of the boy's bedroom door, and a playful bark from Stitch, is the only answer that he gets.

The morning passes by far too quickly for Steve. He's made arrangements with a new client - a run of the mill blackmail scheme - and helped Danny with his homework (science, math, and reading), and before he knows it, the morning's gone, and he's making lunch for the two of them - macaroni and cheese for Danny, a salad and fish for himself, and a bowl of organic puppy food for Stitch that the puppy ignores in favor of sitting at Danny's feet, and waiting for the inevitable to happen. It doesn't take long for some of Danny's mac and cheese to fall to the floor. Stitch practically vacuums it up. Steve doesn't think the puppy takes the time to chew anything, other than Steve's slippers.

Steve has a brief moment to consider that this is now his life, and how bizarre that is when the doorbell rings, and Kento and his mother are standing there, all smiles, and barely contained excitement. Danny kisses Stitch goodbye, admonishing the puppy to, behave, as Steve closes the door to the puppy's crate.

It's almost dizzying, listening to the two little boys talk, heads bent together as though they're the only two people in the world. Mrs. Uehara tries to involve Steve in a discussion about the weather, and then school, and finally gives up when Steve gives single sentence answers. He's never been very good at making small talk, and the closer they get to the fair, the more anxious he feels.

Scoping out the fair ahead of time, had not, unfortunately, given Steve a very clear picture of what it would be like in the early afternoon, with hundreds of people milling about, waiting in line, or running around taking in all of the sights.

Danny and Kento run off together almost as soon as Steve, and, Emi (Mrs. Uehara insisted that Steve call her by her first name) buy them fun passes, and Steve almost has a heart attack, but Emi calls Kento, and the little boy rushes back, Danny with him.

"We need to stick together, boys, this place is a very big place, and I don't want any of us to get lost," Emi says.

Danny's hopping from foot to foot, and his eyes keep darting toward one of the rides (in Steve's assessment it isn't safe enough for Danny). It's clear that he's anxious to get going, but he's being polite.

"But, mom," Kento pleads, pulling on his mom's arm. "Danny and I are together, and we -"

"You need to stick with us, Kento, honey," Emi says. "Right, Steve?"

Steve blinks at her, and nods. He clears his throat. "Your mom's right, it's not safe for you and Danny to go off on your own."

Both boys share an eye roll, but they don't run off, and Steve feels some of the tension bleed from his shoulders as they lead the way to one of the rides. Danny's too short for it.

Even though Kento's tall enough for the ride, he shrugs, and says, "Let's go check out that ride over there, this one looks dumb."

It doesn't look 'dumb'. It looks like it would be a lot of fun. Steve suddenly has a greater appreciation for Danny's friend.

Despite Steve's worries that Danny wouldn't have enough energy (he'd barely touched his lunch for all his excitement) for the fair, it's not Danny's who's flagging by the time that evening falls, but rather him, and Emi, because the boys have run them ragged.

"There's a circus!" Danny tugs on Steve's hand, and pulls him along, he's got a ketchup stain on his Captain America shirt from the hot dog and fries he had earlier, and a smudge of mustard in the corner of his mouth.

* * *

Anton watches McGarrett with the kid, and wonders what the appeal is. His own father had left when he'd been about that brat's age; Victor had been a little older. McGarrett isn't even the kid's father, and yet, here he is, at the damn fiftieth state fair with the little fucker, and one of his friends, letting the kid lead him around by the hand like some kind of overeager puppy.

It's pathetic.

He almost wants to call off the job, focus on why they're really here in Hawaii (to intercept, and reroute a drug and gun shipment for a client in South America) because, from where he's standing, he and Victor will be doing the asshole a favor by taking the kid from him. A domesticated McGarrett is just plain wrong. Maybe, once the kid's out of the picture, he'll come out to play again, and give them an actual fight, like the good old days.

"Five, four..." the comm buzzes in his ear as Victor starts the countdown to the distraction that will enable Anton to carry out his part in the kidnapping of McGarrett's illegally adopted son. The kid he should have sold off to Wo Fat, or killed when his client flipped out and did his job for him.

He adjusts his aviation glasses, and smiles at a kid that waves at him. His skin feels itchy in the police uniform, and he can't wait to get out of it. He's always hated cops; they leave a bad taste in his mouth.

He starts his own mental countdown when Victor reaches one, and then he runs toward the carefully orchestrated distraction - a group of gun-wielding clowns. He smiles when the little boy's hand is ripped from McGarrett's by a man who stumbles into the pair. Grabbing McGarrett's shoulder as though seeking support, he keeps McGarrett from twisting around him to reach the kid. McGarrett finally shakes him off, but it's too late for McGarrett to be reunited with the child. The man they'd paid a pittance to do their bidding keeps on walking, and Anton rushes forward, pretending to call in the attack.

He catches Victor's eye, and nods.

The kid and McGarrett get separated by the crowd that's running from the clowns (a group of gangster wannabes looking to make a name for themselves).

Several shots are fired into the air, and children and adults alike scream.

"Danny!" McGarrett's voice hoarse, panicked, rises above the crowd of people.

McGarrett looks around, frantic as the clowns Victor and Anton had paid to create the distraction, push McGarrett further away from the kid.

"Danny!"

A clown slams the butt of his gun into McGarrett's gut, sending him to his knees. Another presses the barrel of a gun to McGarrett's temple, and Anton watches as the rest of the clowns perform similar acts, separating children from parents, bringing the parents to their knees and letting the children run free. It's all part of their well orchestrated plan. By the time that McGarrett realizes it was them, they will have whisked the boy away to the other side of the island.

Anton keeps his eyes on the bit of blonde hair, and watches as the boy gets carried forward by the panicking crowd, further and further away from McGarrett, and closer to him. Closer to payback.

He wonders what McGarrett's face looks like, if it's taken on that hard look that he gets when he's pissed, or if his face has fallen into a set of worried wrinkles. In a minute, it won't matter, because he'll have the boy, and Victor - dressed as a clown - will have given McGarrett something else to worry about when he puts a bullet in his arm.

The boy is smaller than he thought he'd be, and he looks absolutely terrified, which will work in his favor. Anton stops the boy with a hand on his shoulder, and when the kid looks up at him - all wide-eyed with fear - he gives the kid his best, comforting smile, the one he'd practiced in the mirror for hours. It works. The boy smiles shakily and takes his hand, and Anton can't help but think that the whole thing was too damn easy.

"I lost my Uncle Steve," the kid says, and he sniffs. "And my friend, Kento. Can you help me find them?"

"Sure, kid," Anton says. "Just come with me. I'll help you find your uncle and friend, but first we gotta make sure you're safe."

The retort of several automatic rifles fills the air - he knows that one of them will have been from Victor's gun, and that it's time to start the next phase of their plan.

Anton rushes the boy toward the car he and Victor have 'borrowed' for the night. The boy flinches at the loud sounds of gunfire, and Anton doesn't know what he's supposed to do with a frightened kid when he's pretending to be one of the good guys. He hadn't rehearsed this.

"Look, kid, I know it sounds...scary, but you don't gotta worry about your uncle or friend or nothing," Anton says; the words of comfort feel like rocks in his mouth and he grimaces.

The boy gives him a look that makes Anton feel like he's being assessed by someone much older and wiser, and it gives him the heebie jeebies, because the kid's eyes are still wide as saucers, and he knows that he's fucked this up even before the kid starts to pull away from him.

Anton hauls the kid off his feet and presses a hand over his mouth to keep him quiet. The boy screams something, but it's muffled by Anton's hand. He hates the wet feeling of the boy's heated breath on the palm of his hand, of his tongue and lips when he opens his mouth to scream and bite.

No one's around - they'd parked in a dark corner of the parking lot - and the fair is filled with chaos, no one would be able to process where the scream was coming from, if they could hear it, or differentiate it from any of the others, but Anton doesn't want to take any chances, so he keeps his hand firm against the boy's mouth, and nose, hoping that if the kid can't breathe he'll give up.

The boy fights him like a wildcat, biting, kicking, and scratching at Anton's arms as he struggles to get free. Anton's stronger, and meaner, and fights much dirtier, though. He wraps his other arm around the kid's middle and squeezes until he feels something give, and the boy's breath is nothing more than a wet, oppressive heat against the palm of his hand.

"I'm gonna move my hand, and you're gonna keep your mouth shut. Understand?" Anton squeezes the boy's cheeks.

The boy nods, and Anton waits for a few heartbeats before he moves his hand. The kid's breathing is harsh, like he's struggling to draw in air. Anton doesn't care. He wipes his wet palm on the boy's shirt, and opens the back of the borrowed cop car, setting the subdued boy on the backseat.

"Are you kidnapping me?" the kid asks, hiccoughing. He's looking right at Anton. The tear tracks on his face, silver in the interior light of the car, make Anton's stomach turn.

 _Stop crying, or I'll give you something to cry about._ The remembered words echo in his head, they'd been snarled at the time, said by a man that Anton hadn't remembered until just now, and Anton slaps the boy hard enough to make his head careen into the back seat and rebound.

"You shut up, now," Anton says. "Shut up, and stop crying, and put your damn seat belt on."

The boy raises a hand to his swelling cheek, and blinks at him. Anton narrows his eyes, and the boy flinches away, turns and fumbles with the seatbelt. Losing patience, Anton reaches across the boy, and fastens the belt for him.

"I want to go home," the boy whispers, and Anton sees red.

"Anton," Victor's voice is right in his ear, and he can feel his brother's hand on his arm, pulling at him. "Come on, we don't have time for this, we've got to go."

The red recedes, and Anton can feel a pulse, strong and frenetic beneath the tips of his fingers where they're locked tight around the boy's throat. He doesn't remember doing it, doesn't know how long it's been since Victor got there.

"Fucking kids," Anton says with a snarl. "Don't fucking listen. I'm gonna teach you to listen to me." He looks right into the kid's eyes as he says this, smiles at the way the boy's eyes, blue as the ocean, darken in fear.

"You keep your mouth shut when I tell you to keep your mouth shut."

The boy nods, a jerk of the head, of his whole damn body, and this time Anton thinks that maybe he's got it, that the kid has learned something, that he can move his hand from the boy's throat and the kid won't make a sound.

 _You better listen to me, boy, or you're in for a world of hurt._ Words spoken to him two decades ago make his stomach twist. Oily, dirty words that Anton knows were backed up with pain. He can remember the pain, and the lesson learned with it.

He removes his hand from the boy's throat, and ignores the gasp the boy makes as he draws air in through his bruised throat, the way the boy's hands move to rub at the damage. They're shaking, the boy's whole body is shaking, and it's almost more pathetic than watching McGarrett be led around the fair by the pint sized brat. He doesn't say a word, though, and Anton climbs into the backseat, crawling over the boy to sit on the other side of him, and Victor slams the door shut, cursing, because Anton had wasted too much time in teaching the boy a lesson.

"Fuck, I told you to use the sedative on the kid," Victor says as he starts the car, and pulls out of the parking lot.

The place is overrun with police, and ambulances, and there are groups of displaced kids, and reunited families weeping and clinging to each other. They escape amidst the chaos, and no one even stops them, no one notices that the 'cop' is in the backseat of the car with a kid, and that a clown is the one driving.

It really is much too easy.

"You get the video?" Anton asks.

Victor sighs, but passes his phone back. Anton wants to show it to the kid now, let him know that there is no escape, that this is it for him. That he's got no one to count on. No one who will rescue him from Anton and Victor.

It's all part of the game designed to make McGarrett suffer, and pay for what he's done to them over the years. Make the kid think the man's dead, and then, when the time is right, reunite them, and watch the kid fall apart, show McGarrett how weak the kid is, how easy it is to break him, and then kill the kid in front of him. Let the man live, so that he will always be reminded of his failure.

It's simple, and brilliant. The video that Victor made of McGarrett's 'execution' - manufactured with basic software, and cut together with the actual, non-lethal shot that Victor had taken - is quick, but bloody, and Anton giggles when the boy's face crumples up as he watches his precious 'Uncle Steve' ( _how many 'uncles' did Anton have growing up? He lost track after number five_ ) fall, as blood sprays from the wound and blots out the camera. If Anton didn't know better, he'd think McGarrett was dead, too.

Anton plays the video feed again, and smiles when tears fall, unchecked, down the boy's cheeks. He wipes at them with his thumb, delighting at the way the boy flinches, and the way his breath hitches, and the tears come harder as he tries to brush them away himself.

 _I'll give you something to cry about._ The remembered words are almost tricked out of his mouth, but he bites his tongue, and lets his hand fall lightly on the top of the boy's head, runs his fingers through the soft curls. It feels nice. Like the silk shirts that he sometimes wears.

The boy's crying is soft, and he leans against Anton's side as the video plays out once again, and Anton continues to play with the boy's hair.

He almost feels sorry for the kid, but McGarrett needs to pay for all of the stolen clients, and botched deals, and Anton thinks that he's got to pay for this, too - taking a kid that doesn't belong to him, keeping him, raising him like he's got a right to do so when no one has the right to raise another man's kid. Anton should know this. He's been through plenty of men who thought it was their right to raise him and Victor after their father left them. Pathetic, each and every one of them.

Maybe, though, after they've taught McGarrett his lesson, Anton can keep the kid for himself. When they're quiet, and listen, they're not half bad. Kids that are quiet, and cooperative can be very useful assets.


	2. Vengeance is Ugly

**Disclaimer:** See initial chapter.

 **Warnings:** Allusions to sexual and physical abuse of a child (no graphic details/imagery) both past and present. For those of us with triggers, this might be a story to skip, or a chapter to skip through as the other chapters are all about recovery.

 **A/N:** Thanks for the encouragement to post Irene Claire, and for support as well. Thanks also to Swifters. I do not condone abuse of children, and that is not what this story is about.

* * *

Anton leaves the kid's room with a bit of a swagger and a lopsided grin, and Victor shakes his head. He loves his brother, more than anything in the world, but he doesn't like this. He knows that if he goes into the kid's room now, the boy will be weeping almost silently, shoulders shaking. His blue eyes will be glassy and he'll be hunched in on himself. Like last time.

"What'd you do to the brat this time?" he asks.

He takes a drag on his cigarette, flicks the ashes to the carpeted floor of the dump that they've rented under an alias that McGarrett's unfamiliar with, and wonders if Anton will give him a straight answer, or if he's going to pretend that he's not doing what Victor knows he's doing to the boy. A boy that they still need to hold as leverage over McGarrett for their end game.

Anton shrugs, and raises an eyebrow as he settles himself at the kitchen table, a beer in hand.

"A little of this, and that," he says, smirking.

"Just lay off of the kid until after tomorrow, okay?" Victor asks.

Anton laughs, and shakes his head. "What? You telling me that my big brother suddenly developed a conscience? Fuck, maybe it's that damn kid. He cast some kind of spell over McGarrett, and now he's cast the same spell over you."

Victor shakes his head, and leans forward in his chair. "We gotta keep our eye on the prize, or did you forget that?"

"So, what, we have to treat him with kid gloves, because we're killing McGarrett now instead of just fucking with him?" Anton scoffs, and tilts the neck of his beer in Victor's direction. "That's bullshit. I say that we should stick to our original plan, let Kemp do his own dirty work. This shouldn't be about money."

"It's not just about the money," Victor says, though he knows that his little brother won't listen. He never listens when it comes to things like this.

Vengeance might as well be Anton's middle name. Hell, Victor understands, knows that breaking the kid is the best way - with what they've observed of the man turned father - to break McGarrett, but he doesn't like how obsessed Anton's gotten with the kid.

It isn't about the money for Victor, though Kemp is offering them more money than they've made over the past year to take McGarrett out of the picture permanently; it's about getting his brother back, and about exacting revenge in the best way possible - McGarrett will die, knowing exactly what the boy has been through, and be unable to do a damn thing about it. He will die knowing that he failed the kid that he kept for himself.

Victor has half a mind to tell the boy the truth about his precious Uncle Steve, but with the change in plans, there's no need to wreck the boy like that. Given what the boy has already been through (maybe he _is_ getting just as soft as McGarrett) Victor sees no point in taking that lie away from him, and spoiling it with the truth.

"Whatever," Anton says. "Used to be a time when it was just you and me against the whole fucking world, and now we're doing jobs for lazy fucktards who probably never even held a gun in their whole damn lives. Shit. I ain't doing nothing with that kid that I ain't done with any of the other little whiny, snot-nosed brats that we've held for ransom."

He takes a sip of his beer, and leans back in the chair, lets his legs fall apart, and Victor can see the wet stain on the front of his brother's jeans. Anton unbuttons the fly, and Victor looks away as he slips his free hand down the front of his jeans. There's a hiss, and then his brother moans, and Victor stands suddenly and leaves the room.

He paces outside of the windowless room they've stashed the kid in, and Victor takes a couple more drags on his cigarette before he pushes into the room. It's dark, and it reeks of piss and shit and blood, and of Anton.

The boy flinches and presses himself up against a corner of the wall. There's something about the way that he's shaking that bugs Victor, and he crowds the boy in the corner, squatting in front of him, boxing him in.

The boy's whimpering and shaking his head, and he reminds Victor of Anton at that age, of how he used to be when one of their mother's many useless boyfriends would hurt him.

Hating the memories, and how vulnerable they make him feel, even now, Victor lashes out and slaps the boy, stunning him into wide-eyed silence and stillness that's almost surreal.

"Shut up, you stupid fuck," he says, and he grabs the kid's arm, pulls up the boy's sleeve, and he grinds the cigarette into the boy's flesh. The boy flinches, violently, but he doesn't pull his arm away. Victor lets the butt drop to the floor. Pain used to snap his baby brother out of moments like that when he was a kid, and Victor's pleased to see that pain works with this kid, too.

The boy screams, and tries to pull away from him, and Victor backhands him, drawing blood. Silenced, the boy stares at him, eyes welling with tears. The scent of burnt flesh brings back more childhood memories that Victor would rather keep buried, and he grabs the boy by the hair, and wrenches him from the corner he's tried to hide himself away in.

It's pathetic, he thinks as he tosses the boy onto the stained mattress that's lying in the middle of the floor. The boy's fucking pathetic.

"Please," the boy begs. "I want to go home."

"You don't have a home anymore. Mc...your Uncle Steve's dead," Victor says. "Do you need to see the video again?"

The boy shakes his head, a rumble of sound, like a prolongated, no, comes from him, and, in other circumstances, he'd delight in the way that the lie makes the boy's face crumble, and how it seems to crush the hope right out of the kid, dulling the blue of his eyes.

He straddles the boy and ignores the boy's heaving chest, the way that his mouth twists and his eyes leak tears, and the way that he silently begs him to stop, head shaking back and forth on the crappy mattress that he's buried his fingers in as though trying to hold onto it.

The boy wets himself, and Victor has the strangest urge to apologize to the boy for what he knows Anton did, and what he's terrified that Victor is going to do to him now. To apologize for all of the men who'd hurt his baby brother the way that Anton's hurting this kid, the way that he's hurt all of the other children they've kidnapped over the years.

Instead, he smiles cruelly ( _Fuck all if I'm going to go soft on the little pissant_ ), and presses down on the boy's sternum until the kid passes out, and then he retrieves his fallen cigarette and leaves the room, locking it behind him and pocketing the key.

The meet with McGarrett is tomorrow. He just has to keep Anton away from the boy until then, so there's something of the boy left to use to toy McGarrett with before they finally kill him. He has a feeling that if Anton spends any more time with the kid, the boy will end up catatonic, and he won't be of any use to them like that.

After they meet with McGarrett and kill him, like they've told the boy they've already done, then he can leave the boy with Anton, and let his brother do whatever he wants to the kid to exorcise his demons, or, maybe he can ship the kid off to Wo Fat and wash his hands of the brat, and of the awful memories that the boy is dredging up by looking so much like his brother did at that age - blonde hair; big, innocent blue eyes that lost their lustre and their innocence; nothing but skin and bones.


	3. 6 Days, 7 Hours,and 8 and a Half Minutes

**Disclaimer:** See initial chapter.

 **A/N:** I'd like to thank everyone for their support of this, especially those who read it through for me, and pointed out errors, etc (Swifters and Irene Claire). Please forgive any errors that remain.

* * *

"Danny." Steve keeps his voice as steady as he can, and he focuses, not on the gun that's being pointed at him, but on the little boy who's aiming it at him.

Danny's holding the gun in both hands, and they're shaking. If he does pull the trigger, chances are that the bullet won't hit Steve, even as close as they are. There's a real danger that the recoil from the gun will cause Danny to shoot himself by accident, though. It probably wouldn't be a lethal wound, but that's not a chance that Steve is willing to take.

It's been six days, seven hours, and eight and a half minutes since Steve last saw Danny. Every second of which - from the moment that Danny's hand had slipped away from his hold, to the second before Steve set foot in the dimly lit warehouse, where the Hesse brothers arranged for the meet, and saw Danny - had been a hellish nightmare.

He'd been shot by one of the clowns. The bullet just grazed his shoulder, though it did take a good chunk out of his flesh, it didn't cause much damage. It was bloody, and it had hurt, but Steve had pushed the pain aside immediately in favor of looking for Danny, and finding him in the midst of the panicking crowd.

Now he knows that it was Victor who'd shot him, and that the entire shooting incident at the fair had been carefully orchestrated by the brothers, and all of it had been aimed at him. Their ridiculous quest for revenge had cost the lives of dozens of people - an elderly man had a heart attack; a two year old child had been trampled to death by the panicking crowd; a group of teens had fallen to their deaths when the controllers of the Equinox had been shot out, causing the safety harnesses to fail when they'd been fifty feet in the air; a pregnant woman had gone into labor prematurely, the mother bled out, and the infant didn't make it; a police officer, and two security guards were shot to death. It was the largest, grand scale massacre (that's what the press was calling it) of its kind that Hawaii had ever experienced.

None of that had mattered to Steve, though. When the dust had settled, and he was being tended to by a rather insistent paramedic, all Steve had cared about had been Danny.

It hadn't become clear to him that Danny had been taken until too many precious hours had passed. He blames the paramedic for keeping him in the back of the ambulance in spite of his protests; the police for not doing their jobs; Chin and Kono for not being able to find Danny on the fairgrounds; Kento and his mother for inviting Danny and him to the fair in the first place. Most of all, though, Steve blames himself.

The Hesse brothers hadn't sent the first video of Danny until they'd had him for thirty-six hours. There'd been no demands. No ransom request. Nothing but a crude forty second video of Danny, lying on a soiled mattress in the middle of a dirt floor. He was pale, his hair was a mess, and there were dirt-encrusted tear tracks on his cheeks. His eyes were filled with terror, and he bore heavy bruising around his neck.

Not even Toast had been able to find coordinates, or get anything of value off of the video that would help him find Danny. None of the subsequent videos had anything of use either. Each of them was just a painful reminder of Steve's failure to keep Danny safe from other monsters like him.

Steve had put his fist through the wall of his den when the last video had come in. Danny'd looked shell-shocked, and broken, a ragdoll with most of its stuffing removed. He had been sitting in Anton's lap, the barrel of a gun caressing his face, and another being pressed into his hand. He had taken it absentmindedly, forehead crinkling in confusion and then smoothing out at whatever it was that Anton whispered in his ear.

Steve watched the video dozens of times to make sure that he hadn't imagined the slight tremor in Danny's body when Anton had leaned in close to whisper to him. The look in Anton's eyes, when he'd raised them to look from Danny's face to the camera, made Steve's stomach drop. Anton's smile was predatory. His eyes were filled with lust and wild obsession, and a smug satisfaction - the cat who'd eaten the canary.

Danny's feet shuffle, and the sound of it tears Steve away from the horrible images of Danny in the videos that he'd been taunted with. He's brought back to the present. The barrel of the gun points toward the ground, and then Danny rights it, aims it shakily at Steve.

"Hey, buddy, why don't you put the gun down, and-"

"No!" Danny's voice is hoarse, and there are tears in his eyes, and the barrel of the gun dips dangerously when Danny shakes his head.

"Danny." Steve takes a step toward the little boy.

"Stop!" A single tear rolls down Danny's cheek, and he draws in a shuddering breath."Please stop." The little boy's voice cracks, and he blinks back tears, his fingers clench and unclench around the gun, and Steve holds his breath.

"Stop," he's begging, voice small and shaky.

Steve's run a multitude of scenarios through his head of what would happen when he finally found Danny. This wasn't one of them. Danny, dead, body bloated and grey in a state of decomposition had been one of them, and while this is infinitely better than the worst-case scenario that Steve's mind had conjured, it does nothing to ease his mind.

"Danny, it's okay," Steve says.

It's not okay, and won't be okay until Steve can get the gun away from Danny without either of them getting hurt. Steve knows that Chin and Kono are somewhere nearby, positioned to keep an eye on Steve and Danny, as well as keep a look out for the men responsible for this - Victor and Anton Hesse - but it's no comfort, because for him and Danny, it's just the two of them.

"You're dead," Danny says, swallowing. "He said...he said they killed you. I saw...you're, you're a ghost."

Tears run, unchecked, down Danny's cheeks, and Steve's worried about the erratic way that the gun keeps dipping, and the way that Danny's swaying, as though it's hard for him to remain upright. Steve curses himself, the Hesse brothers, and the man who'd started this all by hiring Steve and his crew to kidnap Danny in the first place. If the asshole who'd hired them to kidnap Danny would have kept his firebug son in check, none of this would be happening now, and Danny would be tucked away in bed, safe from Steve and the sordid world that he lives in. Safe from men like the Hesses, men like Steve. Men who will do anything to anyone, even a little kid, if it pays well enough, or if it suits them.

Steve has more money than he knows what to do with, and when this is over, he's going to start a Trust Fund for Danny, and set up a college fund as well. Danny will want for nothing. If he never wants to work a day in his life, he won't have to.

"Easy, Danny," Steve says. "I know you're confused right now, but it's me. I'm alive. They lied to you, Danny."

Danny's chest heaves with every breath that he takes, and his breathing's got a rattling quality to it that Steve doesn't like. The little boy is much too pale, and there are bruises in the shape of fingers and hands on Danny's arms and legs. There's one particularly dark bruise on his shoulder that ghosts across half of his neck, and for a moment, Steve sees nothing but red.

Danny's still wearing the same clothing that he'd worn when Steve had taken him to the fair a week ago, minus the shoes, and baseball cap. The clothes are dirty and torn, and Steve can smell the stench of sweat, piss and shit from where he's standing. He can smell blood, too.

"Don't come any closer, or I'll shoot," Danny says, and though he's still crying, there's a hint of resolve in his voice that Steve admires. He knows that Danny _will_ shoot. It's heartbreaking, and reassuring at the same time. It means that Danny's not as broken as Steve had feared he was when he'd seen that last video.

Steve wants to know what Danny had been told, and why, even when he's standing right in front of the little boy, Danny still thinks Steve's dead. Whatever it is, it's bad enough to make the little boy tremble in fear, and believe that he is a ghost.

"Where'd you get the gun, Danny?" Steve asks, hoping that keeping Danny talking will break through to him, and prove to him that Steve is alive. He knows, he's seen the video where Anton's given him the gun, but he wants Danny to tell him, needs to do something to jar Danny out of this denial.

"Stop talking, you're not real, you're dead," Danny says.

He brings the gun up to his head to rub at it, and Steve doesn't think, he acts on autopilot, moving forward to take the gun from Danny's shaky hand. Years of working in the military, and as a mercenary, have taught him that second guesses, and hesitation, lead to death, and Danny's life is far too precious for Steve to risk on second guesses.

There is no struggle, but there's little consolation in that, because Danny simply goes limp when Steve touches him, and the gun slips safely from Danny's loose fingers into Steve's hand. It's loaded, and Steve can smell that it's been fired recently, can see powder burns on Danny's hands, and he pulls the boy to himself, holds him close, hopes that Kono and Chin have found Victor and Anton.

"Uh, boss," Kono's voice comes through the earpiece that Steve almost forgot about. Her voice has a strained quality to it.

"Kono?"

Steve disarms the weapon, there's only a single bullet left in it, and sticks it into one of the pockets of his cargo pants. He wraps his arms around Danny, and, ignoring the way that the boy flinches violently, and then stiffens in his arms, as though fearful, yet resigned, he picks him up and holds him to his chest, cupping the back of his head with his hand.

Danny's trembling now and the tears are coming faster. Steve can feel the boy's heart beating wildly in his chest, and he wants nothing more than to hit the rewind button, and erase everything that's led up to this moment.

"Steve, Anton Hesse is dead," Kono says.

Steve's stomach drops, and he knows what happened. Knows with a certainty that he wishes he didn't have, that it was Danny who killed the man.

"Looks like someone emptied an entire clip into him," Kono says.

The words sound tinny, and Steve feels lightheaded, and for some reason he feels like crying. He holds Danny tighter, and kisses the top of the boy's head. Danny wraps his legs and arms around Steve, his earlier reluctance suddenly gone, clinging to him like an octopus trying to bury itself in the sand at the bottom of the ocean.

Steve wants nothing more than to walk away from everything, and hide Danny from the entire world for the rest of his life, but Kono's still talking to him, telling him what type of weapon was used, though Steve doesn't need to hear it, because he's got the murder weapon tucked safely away in his pocket, the murderer safe in his arms.

"Anyone have eyes on Victor?" Steve asks, though he already knows that no one has eyes on Victor, but Victor has eyes on him and Danny. He can feel it in his gut, in the way that the tiny hairs on the back of his neck suddenly stand at attention, the carefully concealed crunch of a boot in the gravel that surrounds them, the press of cold steel on the back of his head, the way that Danny goes rigid in his arms, and starts to shake uncontrollably.

Danny pisses himself, the hot urine stains the front of Steve's shirt, and trickles down between them, getting trapped in the fabric, and wetting their skin. Steve's experienced this kind of reaction before. He knows what it takes to make someone piss themselves at the mere sight of their kidnapper. Sometimes the victim doesn't even need to see their captor, the telltale sound of their footsteps, the sound of their voice, the smell of their sweat or cologne, are enough to trigger a reaction like this. One of pure terror and hopelessness.

Steve could've broken Danny in the same way when he'd first kidnapped him, minus a few of the uglier touches, things that Steve hopes haven't happened to Danny, but knows, by the boy's reaction, the way that Anton had whispered to the boy in the video, the look that had been in the now dead man's eyes. Steve could have made the boy afraid of his own shadow for years, if not the rest of his life. He could have reduced the little boy to a nothing more than an empty shell without going as far as Anton and Victor have. He's done it before, and, given the right job, he might do it again. He used to take pride in reducing a child to Danny's current state. Now, Steve feels nothing but disgust for himself and the Hesse brothers.

He'd come close to doing that to Danny, and, holding the frightened boy now, with Victor breathing down his neck, he's not sure why he didn't do to Danny what Victor and Anton have accomplished in the week that they've had him. Why he didn't make the boy afraid of him, afraid of what goes bump in the night.

What was it that had stayed his hand? Was it Danny? Did the little boy hold some kind of key to Steve's psyche? What was it about Danny that had stopped Steve from doing what he normally did to those that he'd been hired to kidnap?

Whatever it was, it hadn't stopped the Hesses. Danny's not magical, or special. If he was, the Hesses would have been just as incapable of harming Danny as Steve had been. Clearly, that hadn't been the case.

Maybe everyone's right, and Steve _is_ getting too soft. Maybe he _is_ losing his edge. Maybe it's time that he stopped pretending to play at being a parent and get back to being what he really is: a cold-blooded mercenary whose first, and only, concern is himself, and the state of his bank accounts. Life was much simpler before Danny, much simpler when he didn't have a conscience to complicate things.

Danny twitches, and whimpers, burrows into Steve, hiding his face from Victor, and Steve mentally shakes himself. He didn't break Danny, and he's willing to bet that, once he gets Danny home, where he belongs, he'll find that Danny's a little less broken than he seems to be right now.

"You sure do know how to pick them, McGarrett," Victor says, sarcasm and something like a begrudging pride coloring his tone. The steel of the gun digging into Steve's temple is a reminder of what's at stake. A reminder of his own actions years ago when he'd first met the Hesse brothers.

"This one's feisty. Kid's got a damn good right hook, and a hell of a bite, and he's a damn good shot." That's definitely pride in the man's voice. It makes Steve's stomach twist.

"I think, after I've concluded our unfinished business here, I'll take the kid, raise him in the family business, like his dear, dead dad, Steve, would have done had he not screwed over the wrong people. Teach the kid right from wrong, such as it's not right to kill family, no matter how fucked up they are, and that it's okay to kill those who get in the way. He'll make a damn fine baby brother, and if I get bored with him, I'll just ship him off to Wo Fat and his merry little band of fuckers," Hesse says, and he digs the gun deeper into Steve's temple. "But first I've got to teach the little bastard a lesson. You reap what you sow, Danny boy. You killed my brother, I'm going to kill your Uncle Steve, for real this time, and then I'm going to punish you."

Danny shakes his head, and whimpers against Steve's neck. He clings tighter to Steve, blunt nails digging painfully into Steve's biceps, drawing blood.

"No, no, no, no, no," Danny protests, voice growing as his level of distress increases. "No, please, please, Uncle Steve, noooooo..."

"Sh, Danny," Steve says, ignoring Victor in favor of attempting to soothe Danny. "I'm here now, I've got you, and I'm never going to let you go. Okay?"

Hesse laughs, and Danny cringes, and starts moaning. It's a sound that Steve's heard before, from some of his own victims, from some of Wo Fat's that he'd been asked to finish off. It's a sound that he never wants to hear again. It makes him sick, and he rubs Danny's back, and runs fingers through the boy's sweaty hair.

"That's quite the promise for a dead man to make," Hesse whispers the words into Steve's ear and ruffles Danny's hair. "I'm going to enjoy teaching Danny the ropes of the business, breaking him down, and making him into a cold-blooded killer, like you used to be before you turned soft."

There's a click, the sound of Hesse's gun being readied, and Steve knows that he's got seconds, at best, to act, to protect Danny. Seconds during which Danny stops breathing, and Steve knows, hopes, that it's a panic attack, and nothing worse.

"That's not going to happen, boss." Kono's voice sounds in his ear a split second before the retort of a gunshot echoes in the predawn.


	4. Out of the Closet

**Disclaimer:** See initial chapter.

 **A/N:** Steve still has a lot to learn about what it takes to be a father. Please forgive errors, and Steve for having cold feet. Thanks for those who have been supportive.

* * *

"Steve," Deb's voice is weary, verging on panic, and Steve doesn't have time to take a call right now, let alone devote any attention to it. He doesn't quite know why he answered. Something about the ringtone, knowing that it belonged to Danny, must've triggered the response.

He's got an eye on his target - a drug dealer from Colombia that the cartel wants terminated - and a very limited window of opportunity to take the kill shot.

He'd made a promise to his aunt, a promise to Danny, that when he left on his week long 'business trip', that he'd be available to contact for emergencies- it had been the only way that he could get his Aunt Deb to agree to watch Danny - but now was possibly the worst timing possible. Though the area where they are is crowded, and there are several people on their phones, Steve needs to be able to act on Kono's cue.

"Can't talk right now," he says, but Deb talks over him.

"Danny's barricaded himself in his closet, and I can't get him to come out," Deb says.

Steve sighs and runs a hand through his hair, he ignores Chin's raised eyebrow and the questioning look that Kono casts in his direction. This doesn't sound like an emergency to him. It's not like any harm can come to Danny in his closet.

There's a niggling thought in the back of his mind that he really shouldn't have left Danny so soon after what had happened with the Hesse brothers, that he should have passed on this job. It paid well, and it was a relatively easy hit, but Danny had only been home for three weeks, and there had been problems. He feels guilty, but he can't put his life on hold for Danny, and, truth be told, he doesn't really know what to do for the boy. He'd needed a break.

"He's been there since sometime last night," Deb continues. "Steve, I'm worried. He's surrounded by all of his toys and clothes, and -"

"I'm almost finished with the job," Steve says, voice curt and businesslike. "I'll come home as soon as I've wrapped up this deal."

"Steve, I think Danny needs professional help," Deb says, voice pinched and worried, and Steve wants to bring Victor and Anton Hesse back to life so that he can kill them himself, because he hates what they've done to Danny, and that there's nothing that he can do to fix it. Everything he's tried to do for Danny has failed: talking, offering to listen, giving him space, waking him from nightmares, and sitting with him. Danny's been unresponsive, and withdrawn, and Steve doesn't know what else to do.

He hates that Danny'd killed Anton in a state of terror (the subject of most of Danny's nightmares), and that it was Kono's expert marksmanship which had ended Victor's life a split second before he could end Steve's.

He hates that, at the end of the day, he wasn't the one who'd been able to protect, and then ensure Danny's safety from the monsters who'd taken him and hurt him in ways that Steve would never dream of hurting a kid. He hates the thought of Danny needing more than what he can give him, of going to someone outside his small circle of trust, and asking for help to fix what he'd helped, in part, to break.

"We'll talk when I get back," Steve says, and he ends the call before his aunt can say anything else, turns his ringer off, and pockets his phone. He can't do anything for Danny right now, won't be able to do anything until he's done this job, and is home, and even then, he's not sure that he'll be able to do anything for the boy.

Danny won't let Steve get near him anymore, he flinches, and whimpers at every loud noise, and always has this haunted look in his eyes - like he's still seeing Anton and Victor around every corner. He barely eats, can't sleep without having nightmares, and Steve really shouldn't have left him.

At first, Danny'd been overly clingy, and he'd stick suffocatingly close to Steve, but then he'd stopped talking, and eating, and started avoiding Steve. It was almost like a switch had been flicked - one day he'd seemed okay, and then, suddenly he wasn't.

He'd started to throw tantrums - long drawn out screaming matches that ended with something broken, or Danny's room in a complete disarray, bedclothes strewn across the room, mattress half on the floor, broken blinds - or he'd shut down completely, and walk around like a zombie, or sit in a corner of his room and rock, and nothing Steve did, or said seemed to get through to him when he was like that, it was like talking to a wall.

One minute Danny would be screaming, and the next, he'd be frozen, still and quiet as a statue. He'd hide himself in tight spaces, and mutter a long string of no's, or pleas to be left alone, in an almost monotone voice. Steve couldn't touch him then, he could only sit opposite Danny and speak reassuring nonsense to the boy that he hoped would get through - sometimes it worked, and Danny would snap out of whatever memory he'd been trapped in, and sometimes Steve would sit there and talk until his mouth and throat went dry. Touching Danny resulted in bruises and scratches, and, the day before Steve left on his latest job, Danny had given Steve a bloody nose.

"The target is in sight," Kono's voice comes over the comm, breaking Steve out of his thoughts.

She's in place, hidden. Steve can see Chin out of the corner of his eye, and he pushes away all thoughts of Danny, and his aunt's proposal that he seek professional help for the boy. He can't afford to think of anything other than the objective right now. Can't afford to think about how much he's failed Danny, and how he can't reach him, no matter how hard he tries.

"It's go time, boss," Chin says, and Steve is a heartless, cold-blooded killer on a mission once more; Danny and Aunt Deb are locked in a box in the far reaches of his mind as he approaches the man that he's going to kill with a smile on his face, and a makeshift shiv in his hand.

It's easier than he'd thought it would be, shoving the weapon into the man's gut, twisting, pulling it upward, ensuring that the man _will_ die, bleeding out before he can get to help - his bodyguards are a few feet behind him, he's with his kid, they're enjoying an icecream cone, his guard's down, because it's a Sunday, and nobody gets killed on a lazy Sunday afternoon walking down a busy sidewalk - the man staggers, and clutches at his side, but doesn't go down until Steve's moved off into the crowd. Steve smiles to himself as he walks away, easily blending into the crowd.

He hears the son's distraught cry when his father falls, but his step doesn't falter. He's got a son of his own waiting for him at home, and that is the only kid that matters. Everyone else's sons can fend for themselves, and it's time that the drug dealer's kid understands what will happen to him if he follows in his father's footsteps. The kid can't stay naive forever.

Steve ignores the nasty voice in his own head - it sounds like Victor - which reminds him that Danny can't stay naive forever either, that, one day, he's going to find out the truth about what Steve does, and the truth about how he ended up with Steve in the first place. The truth about his parents' death, about why he was taken by the Hesse brothers, and why Steve takes these long 'business trips' that leave him in his Aunt Deb's care.

If Steve isn't careful, the truth is going to reach out and kill him, just like it killed Tomás Muñoz Sr. without any warning; death will creep up to him like a stroll down the street on a lazy Sunday afternoon, and by the time he realizes that death has come for him, it'll be too late.

Steve makes it back to Oahu in record time, drops Chin off at home, keeps his phone off so that he won't get any more calls that he can't do anything about, hopes that Danny's come out of the closet, because he has no idea what he's going to do if he hasn't. He's been out of his depth with Danny since he'd gotten him back from the Hesse brothers. They'd had Danny for a few hours less than a full week, but the damage they did to him is going to last a lifetime, and Steve doesn't know if he has what it takes to see Danny through it all.

Kono's is the last stop before Steve heads home, and he knows that he's stalling, that he doesn't have to walk Kono up to her door, but he does it anyway. He wants to get home to Danny, and his Aunt Deb, but he's not sure what he's going to walk into, and that not knowing has him irrationally afraid.

"You okay, bossman?" Kono asks around a yawn, key in the doorway to her home.

Steve nods. "Yeah, fine. Get some sleep, you've earned it."

Kono turns and gives him a hug. It's a quick, there then gone, thing, and Steve isn't sure what to do with it, because they don't hug in their line of work. They're almost like family - it's hard not to consider those you work with family when growing up in Hawaii - but they've always kept a professional distance, and this is the first time that it's ever been bridged.

"It's going to be okay," Kono says, and Steve wonders if she even knows what she's talking about. "I've seen you with Danny, you're good with him. You're good _for_ him. You'll help him through this."

Steve shakes his head. "I'm...Kono I fucked up with Danny, I should never have -"

Kono places a finger on his lips, and glares at him. "No, Steve, you don't get to do that. None of us gets to do that. We can't take back anything that we do. Not in our line of work. Not in the world that we live in. Think about _this_ , boss," she jabs a finger in Steve's chest, brown eyes narrowed, "if we hadn't taken Danny when we did, if we hadn't kidnapped him for that rich asshole, that little boy would be dead with the rest of his family, body burned to ashes. He'd be dead, Steve. Us taking him - it wasn't just you, Steve, it was you, Chin, and me," Kono jabs him in the chest again, and then points at herself.

"We're a team, _we_ took Danny from his family. _We_ , not you, Steve. We saved his life then, even if we didn't know that's what we were doing at the time, and we saved it when the Hesses took him, and, fuck...I don't know why, or how this has become our lives, but we'll save his life as many times as we need to, because, like it or not, he's part of this team. This family." Kono lets out a breath, and runs a hand through her hair. There are dark circles under her eyes - none of them have slept more than a few hours in the past four days - but there's a spark of energy about her that Steve can feel in the air between them.

"Steve, Danny's 'ohana. You're 'ohana, and 'ohana doesn't turn its tail and run when the going gets tough; it digs its claws into the dirt, and gets ready to fight, or to settle in for the long haul," Kono finishes, impassioned, hand gripping the front of Steve's shirt and pulling him close.

Steve thinks for a moment that she's going to shake, or, worse, kiss, him, but she lets go of his shirt, and pushes him back a step. She gives him a searching look, and then her eyes soften.

"Steve, we're all in this together, through thick and thin. 'Ohana's not blood, here. It goes deeper than that. 'Ohana's who you stand side-by-side with, who you shed blood for, and with," Kono says, sounding more tired than she has in a long time.

"'Ohana is heart, soul, dirt and blood. It's down and dirty, and it's what keeps us going when the rest of the world is telling us to throw in the towel and quit." She presses a hand to Steve's chest, above his heart. It's warm, and strong, and solid.

"We'll get Danny through this, Steve. Promise. You're not alone. Danny's not alone. He's got all three of us, brah," Kono says, slapping his chest. "He's got an entire 'ohana on his side, both of you do."

Steve nods, swallows past the dryness in his throat. He doesn't have any words. None that are adequate. "Tha- mahalo," he says. "I...Aunt Deb says I should get Danny professional help."

Kono smiles, tight-lipped, eyes hard. She nods. "Ask Chin, Malia might know someone we can send Danny to. Someone safe."

Steve nods. It might not be the worst idea to send Danny to a child psychologist. Trust issues aside, Danny might need to talk with someone about what Anton and Victor did to him.

"I'll look into it," he says, and holds up his hands when Kono opens her mouth. "I mean, I'll talk to Chin."

"Good, now, go home, Steve," Kono says, shooing, and pushing at him. "Some of us need to get our beauty sleep."

Steve laughs. He watches Kono enter the house, and waits for the lock to fall into place before he leaves, heart, and outlook a little lighter than it had been, though he doesn't know what he'll be walking into when he gets home.

' _Ohana_.

He'd grown up hearing the word, but, until now, he'd never really felt the kind of connection that Kono was talking about. He'd never really been part of something bigger and better than himself, never felt as though he belonged - not even with his own family. He'd felt nothing for anyone until Danny'd come into his life. It's a terrifying thought, one that Steve has no idea what to do with.

Steve turns on his phone as he nears the house he grew up in. There are a dozen missed calls, three messages, one of which makes him wince, and grimace. His aunt rarely resorts to swearing, but when she does, Steve knows that she means business, and that she's pissed. She has every right to be.

"Where is he?" Steve wastes no time with pleasantries, Aunt Deb would probably punch him if he did. She looks like she hasn't slept since he last spoke to her, almost twenty-four hours ago, and ready to rip into him. He's deserving of it.

"He hasn't left his room since you've been gone," Aunt Deb says. "He hasn't slept, or eaten, he hasn't moved since he buried himself inside of the closet. Steve, he needs help."

"I know," Steve says. "I'm working on it. I'm sorry. I was working on something that was time sensitive, and I -"

"Steve, you're a father now, like it or not, and that means that Danny comes first, before work, before fun, before anything, and anyone else," Aunt Deb says. "He needs to come first, Steve. He needs to know that you love him, that you're here for him, that you aren't going to leave him, that work isn't more important to you than he is."

"In other words, I need to be what my own father and mother weren't," Steve says, the words coming out more harshly than he'd intended for them to be. It's an age old argument, one that Aunt Deb had had, and often, with Steve's father and mother, when Steve and Mary weren't supposed to be listening.

"Steve, that's not what I meant," Aunt Deb says tiredly. "Just go to your son, he needs you. Stop having him call you Uncle Steve. He deserves to know who you really are to him. That little, hurting boy, deserves to know the truth."

Steve rubs at his eyes, and nods. He'd laugh, but he doesn't have the energy, and doesn't want to insult his aunt anymore than he already has. If Danny knew the truth, the kid would hate him, and, while he might deserve that hate, Danny doesn't deserve to grow up with that kind of hate. That kind of hate is what leads to lives spent hell bent on obtaining revenge. It leads to people becoming like the Hesse brothers...like Steve, and Chin and Kono. That kind of hate is the kind that makes killers of people.

"I'll tell him," Steve promises. _What's one more lie in a whole laundry list of them?_

Aunt Deb places a hand on Steve's arm, squeezes it gently. "I think it'll help. He needs his father right now, not an uncle, or his old, loving aunt. I don't know what happened to him when he was with those men who took him, but I think it was bad, Steve. The boy that you brought back isn't the same vivacious, happy little boy that I have come to know and love. He's frightened, and angry, and I'm afraid for him."

"I'll take care of it," Steve says, closing his eyes against the images that pop into his mind at his aunt's words.

He _can_ imagine, all too well, what Danny went through, what Anton and Victor did to the little boy while he was with them. Some of it is what Steve's done to other people's children - sensory deprivation paired with sensory overload; drugging; denial of basic necessities, like water and food, the use of a bathroom; pain ( _there are cigarette burns in Danny's arms, on his stomach, and thighs, round scars that may never completely disappear from Danny's skin_ ) used to motivate and deter certain behaviors; lies designed to manipulate, and control...

Steve's never had to live with the aftermath of his actions before. He's never witnessed _this_ side of a kidnapping. He can admit now, to himself, to Danny, to his Aunt Deb, should they ask, that his taking on this last job was the equivalent of running away, from Danny, from himself, from a past that he'll never be able to leave behind, or atone for, no matter how long he lives, or how many children like Danny he saves along the way. Not that he has any plans of taking in anymore kids, or, thinks that (in spite of Kono's claims) he'd saved Danny in the first place. In a way, it's Danny who's saved him.

If he was a better man, he might even feel bad about killing Muñoz in front of his kid. He doesn't.

When he thinks of that kid, it's Danny he sees, and Steve doesn't want Muñoz Junior to grow up following in his father's footsteps, just like he doesn't want Danny to grow up to follow in _his_ footsteps.

He knows that it might be his actions which push Muñoz Junior over the edge, and cause him to walk down the very path that his father had, that he might, like the Hesse brothers, spend his entire life seeking revenge for his deadbeat father's death, but he hopes that, against all odds, the boy will choose something different for himself. That he'll see his father's death - bleeding out on a busy sidewalk - as a wake up call, and strive to do something better with his life.

"This isn't going to be a simple fix, Steve. You've got a traumatized little boy who's barricaded himself in his bedroom closet, because he's terrified. It's not just this either, Steve. He shies away from touch, won't go near a tub full of water," Aunt Deb says, ticking things off with her fingers as she talks.

"He refuses to sleep in his bed. The other night, I went into his room to check on him, and he'd surrounded himself with a nest of blankets and pillows, and tucked himself into the corner furthest from the door. He's stopped breathing at times, Steve," her voice cracks, and tears fill her eyes, and Steve doesn't know what to do with that, because his aunt has never been a crier.

"He needs his daddy, Steve," Aunt Deb says. "He's been asking, begging, for his daddy, for his Uncle Steve, and honestly, I think that, in his head, they're already synonymous terms for him. Whatever it is that you're afraid of, you need to put it behind you, and get your act together, because your son needs you to be there for him, and he needs you to be strong. Don't run away again, Steve. Even if Danny forgives you for it, I don't think I will."

"I won't," Steve says. It's hard to meet his aunt's eyes, but he does. They're steely, and full of fire, and resolve.

"Good, now, get your head out of your ass, and march up those stairs and go take care of that boy of yours." She pushes him in the direction of the stairs, and Steve nearly stumbles up them.

He can hear her muttering about the stubbornness, and stupidity of McGarrett men, and cursing, while slamming cupboard doors open and shut in the kitchen, but it's only half-hearted, and he can hear the unspoken relief in her words and actions as she busies herself with meal preparations. Steve has no idea what time it is. After completing his job, he'd had a single-minded focus - getting home to Danny.

The closer he gets to Danny's bedroom, the more nervous Steve is, and he wishes that he hadn't sent Danny's dog, Stitch, to stay with Danny's friend, Kento, and his mother after the incident at the fair.

Danny hasn't asked about the dog, and, in the chaos that had surrounded Danny's return home, Steve had completely forgotten about the ungainly beast. He wonders if it would have helped Danny to have the puppy around. He'd read, or heard, somewhere that pets could be therapeutic. If he found Danny a psychologist, or therapist, that he could trust (one who wouldn't report the shooting if Danny talked about it, or dig too deeply into Steve's background), he'd ask about it.

But first, he has to get Danny to come out of the damn closet, and he's not sure that he's got what it takes. Steve reaches for his phone, pulls it out of his pocket, intent on calling Chin immediately, and getting Malia's recommendation for someone that Steve can call for Danny, someone who can do what he can't seem to make himself do. Someone who can walk through the door of the room that's been Danny's for over a year now, and know what to say, how to help the little boy.

Sighing, Steve pockets the phone, and wonders how the family members of those he's taken over the years had handled everything that came after they'd gotten their loved one home safely. How do they cope? Are there support groups, or self-help books, for that kind of thing?

Steve doesn't see himself joining any support groups, but he wonders how those who aren't in the business of kidnapping and killing cope with the aftermath of what people like Steve, Chin and Kono leave behind. How do they handle their Danny's? How do they talk their children out of closets, or get them to sleep after a nightmare? How do they get rid of the dead, haunted look in their loved one's eyes?

"Danny?" Steve calls before he enters the room. He knocks on the doorframe as well, giving Danny a head's up that he's going to come in, so the kid's not spooked any more than he already is. It seems like the right thing to do, like something that he'd want someone to do for him if he was in Danny's position.

The stench of piss hits him as he steps into the room, and Steve falters just inside, more unsure about this than he's been about anything he's ever done in his life. He's killed innocent people without remorse, and without this gut-wrenching doubt.

How long has Danny been sitting in his own piss?

How long had he been left like that when he was with the Hesses?

Is that where Danny thinks he is right now, with the Hesse brothers, lying on that thin mattress, or trapped within Anton's or Victor's suffocating grasp?

How the fuck is Steve going to get through to Danny?

What does he do?

What should he say?

He's never been a coward before. How does he face Danny after he's turned tail and run?

"Danny?" Steve takes another step into the room.

It's dark, lit only by the Ironman nightlight near the bed, and the light that spills in through the blinds. Judging by the brightness of the lines of light that are cast across the carpet from the sun, it must be around noon.

It's eerily quiet, and Steve holds his breath, listens for a sign that Danny's still alive, that he's still breathing.

He hears nothing.

Fear forms a fist in Steve's gut, and then he hears it. It's so soft that it's almost not there, the hitch of an inhale that tells Steve that Danny's alive, that he's breathing, that the boy is awake, and alert, that he's regulating his breathing, trying to throw him off, trying not to make a sound that will give himself away.

He's hiding.

Steve pauses in the middle of the room. Silent as stone.

It's a game of hide-and-seek, but with much higher stakes, and suddenly, Steve's dizzy with exhaustion, but he pushes it aside, because this is not a game. This is real.

Steve can hear Aunt Deb in the kitchen, though she's stopped slamming cupboards. He can smell nutmeg and cinnamon, the hickory of bacon, and he knows that she's making french toast for Danny. It's his favorite.

Steve can't remember the last time that Danny ate french toast. It was sometime before the Hesses had taken him. He can't remember the last time that he's eaten french toast. All food tastes like cardboard now, and it sits like a solid weight in his stomach. Steve hasn't eaten or slept for days, and he knows that neither has Danny.

"Danny, I'm sorry," Steve says. "I'm sorry that I left." _I'm sorry that I ran away like a fucking coward._

Steve listens for Danny's next breath. It comes and goes, and there's no change in it. No acknowledgement of Steve's presence, of his apology, that Danny's heard him at all.

"Danny."

Steve takes a step toward the closet and waits a heartbeat, waits for Danny's next breath to come and go before he takes another step, and then another, and another, until he's standing in front of the closet.

"Danny, I'm going to open the closet door now," Steve says, and he waits, listens for Danny's next breath to come.

It doesn't, and Steve holds his own breath, counts to ten, and lets out a relieved breath when Danny finally draws in a sharp breath and lets out a shaky one.

"Danny, is it okay if I open the closet door?" Steve asks, biting his lip as he waits for an answer that he doubts will come. Danny hasn't spoken much since Steve recovered him from the Hesse's.

Steve waits for Danny's next breath to come and go. It's heavy, and erratic, and Steve knows that Danny's on the verge of having a panic attack, and he's not sure if he should just tear the door open and pick Danny up, or if he should give the boy a countdown in preparation. He's not sure which method would work best, which one would remind him the least of his time with the Hesses.

A countdown might make things worse. Steve sometimes uses countdowns with his victims. Countdowns are handy tools of terror, keeping the victim on the edge, waiting for what happens when the counter reaches one, or ten, or zero.

"No." The response is whisper soft, and muffled, but it's there, and Steve's heart hammers in his chest.

Steve places his palm on the door, closes his eyes and swallows. He feels like he's aged a decade in the last five minutes, and he's so damn tired.

Steve wants to tear down the door that stands between him and Danny, rip it to shreds, and gather the little boy into his arms where he can keep him safe, but he can't. He wonders how many times Danny'd said, no, to Anton and Victor, and how many times they had done what Danny'd told them, begged them, not to. How many times had they laughed at, and mocked, the boy's denials?

How many times had Steve pressed on when he'd been told no? Too many times to count.

Steve drops to his knees, presses his forehead to the door that separates him from Danny.

"Danny, I'm sorry," Steve says. He feels like a broken record. Hell, he just feels broken.

"I..." Steve doesn't know what to say, wonders what his father or mother would have said had he been where Danny is now, where the little boy _was_ almost four weeks ago now.

 _Hey, Sport, it's time to come out of the closet now. You're safe. No one's going to hurt you._

 _You're home, Steven. Nothing bad's going to happen to you. Stop being so childish._

 _You're too old to play games like this._

Steve closes his eyes against the memory of his parents' voices, his heart heavy with everything that's happened, with the thought that he can't conjure up a single thing inspired by his upbringing that he can say to Danny. None of it seems like the right thing to say, and he doesn't have the energy to explore any of the emotions that his thoughts of his parents are stirring up.

 _Chin up, son. Things will look better after you've had something to eat, and a good night's sleep._

Steve laughs quietly, it sounds like a sob. He sits down in front of Danny's closet, wondering if he should just walk away, give Danny time to come out on his own.

How long has it been since Aunt Deb had called him? A day and a half? Longer? Danny's been in the closet for two, maybe three days. Chances are that he's not going to come out on his own if Steve leaves.

"Danny..." Steve's so tired, and lost. "Danny, can I come in?" he asks, voice sounding far more desperate than he'd like. "You don't have to come out, and I won't open the door, but...would it be okay for me to come in?"

Steve waits for a response, hoping, but doubting that it will be, yes.

Danny's been through so much, and most of what he's been through, regardless of what Kono says, has been Steve's fault. The Hesse's had targeted him, not Kono or Chin, and it had been his decision, not those of his team members, to keep Danny, to raise him up in this kind of life. He'd been naive and stupid to think that he could keep Danny and have the boy lead a normal life.

 _I'm going to enjoy teaching Danny the ropes of the business, breaking him down, and making him into a cold-blooded killer, like you used to be before you turned soft._ Victor's last words echo in Steve's head so loudly that he almost misses Danny's quiet question: "Why?"

"Because I've missed you, Danny, and...I'm tired," Steve says. _I'm so fucking worried about you that I can't think straight, and I can't breathe._

"You're not a ghost," Danny says, the words spoken softly, and Steve knows that Danny's saying them to himself, that he's reminding himself that Steve isn't dead, that Steve is not a ghost.

 _Fuck, fuck, fuck, you're really fucked things up this time, haven't you, McGarrett._ Victor's laughter rings in Steve's head, haunting him from the grave.

Leaving had been the worst thing that Steve could have done.

 _Shit._

"Danny, I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere," Steve says. "I -"

"Promise?" Danny's voice is nearer now.

"Promise," Steve says around a swallow.

He'd promised that he'd never let Danny go when Victor had held a gun to his head, but Steve _had_ let Danny go. He'd let his own fear - cowardice - get in the way, and he'd broken his promise. He'd let Danny down.

"Promise?" Danny asks again, voice strained.

"Danny, I'm not going anywhere, I promise," Steve says, heart in his throat.

The sound of shuffling comes from the closet, and Steve holds his breath, waits to see if Danny believes him. He wouldn't blame Danny if he no longer trusted him.

"You can come in," Danny says, and then he pushes the door open.

The closet reeks of pee and sweat, and Steve is overcome with recent memories, of the horror of being reunited with a bruised, and battered Danny who'd been pointing a gun at him. This isn't the same, there's no stench of blood, no scent of Anton, or gunpowder clinging to Danny's skin.

Steve crawls into the tight space anyway, lets Danny lead the way toward the back of the closet, over an army of stuffed animals, and a barricade of blankets and pillows. It's hot and stuffy, and Steve wonders how Danny can stand the smell, and the tightness of the space itself.

"I'm tired," Danny says, and he crawls into Steve's lap, turns his face toward Steve's chest, and wraps his arms around Steve's middle. Steve's arms, operating on autopilot, slip around Danny, holding him close in a way that he hasn't been able to do for awhile.

"I want to go home now, Dad."

Danny's eyes slip closed, and his breath evens out, and he's asleep before Steve has a chance to process the meaning of Danny's words, and his behavior - it's a complete three hundred sixty degree change from how Danny had been behaving when Steve had left almost a week ago - before he has time to reassure Danny that, this time, Steve _is_ going to stay, and he's going to help Danny get through all of the hurt and anger and fear, no matter how long it takes, and what he has to do.

Exhausted, physically, and emotionally, Steve has an almost overwhelming desire to cry. He scrubs at his eyes, and presses his fingertips into his eyelids.

"Okay, Danny," Steve murmurs, lips brushing against Danny's temple. "You can come home now."

Danny sighs, and snuggles closer, fingers instinctively bunching the fabric of Steve's shirt as he anchors himself to him. Steve leans back against the closet wall, and, with Danny cradled to his chest, he closes his eyes, and sleeps.


	5. Grateful

**Disclaimer:** See initial chapter.

 **A/N:** This is the end of this particular portion of the 'Kidnapper' series. I believe that healing is a lifelong process. There will be loose ends. Much mahalos to IreneClaire and Swifters for encouragement, and for reading and offering suggestions throughout the writing process.

* * *

"No."

Danny's body stiffens, waking Steve before the little boy's nightmare can truly take hold. Steve blinks in the darkness, instinctively tightening his arms around Danny before the reminder comes, in Dr. Bergman's clipped voice, not to _hold, grab, or grip Danny too tightly._

He loosens his hold on Danny just as the boy starts to thrash and cry out, reliving the horrors that Anton and Victor visited upon him.

It's been months now, almost half a year, since Steve had gotten Danny from the Hesses. Some days are good, and others are...filled with the ghostly traces of Victor and Anton.

Steve braces himself for another sleepless night, and traces Danny's face with his index finger. The boy finds the light touch soothing, and it seems to ground the both of them to the present.

Steve whispers reassurances to the boy, reminders that he's safe, at home, with his dad, and that the men who'd hurt him won't be able to hurt him ever again.

Dr. Bergman had insisted that Steve refer to himself as dad during times like these, and that he not discourage Danny from calling him dad. He hadn't understood why Steve had told Danny to call him Uncle Steve in the first place.

Danny wakes from the nightmare abruptly, gasping for air, and reaching out for Steve, clinging to him, and weeping. Steve rubs his back, and listens to the boy's stilted whispers as Danny tells him what he saw, what happened to him when he was with Anton and Victor.

Tonight he'd dreamt about Anton. Steve bites his lip, and forces himself to remain calm as Danny talks about the abuse, about how Anton's fingers had made him feel like he had worms crawling underneath his skin, and how, even after he'd told Anton, " _No,"_ like the police officer who'd visited their school, and told them about 'bad touch' had told them to do, the man hadn't stopped.

"Why didn't he stop, Dad?" The question's quiet, and muffled by Steve's pajama shirt as Danny's lips are pressed against it. "I said, no. I did what the policeman said. I even...I...I kicked him, and hit him, and, and he didn't stop."

Steve has no words. He wonders what Dr. Bergman would say to Danny right now. How he would handle this.

"Sometimes bad people don't listen to what good people say," Steve says, hoping that he's not screwing things up irreversibly with words.

He can feel Danny frown, lips pulling at his shirt. "But why not?"

 _I don't know,_ Steve thinks, but he says, "Because they're broken inside." He hates saying that. Hates even thinking about excusing Anton and Victor's behavior in any way. Brokenness is not an excuse for sexually assaulting a child. It may be a reason, but it's not an excuse. Steve's not sure how to communicate that to Danny.

"Like me?" Danny asks, voice small, and breath hitching.

Steve clutches Danny tightly to his chest, and then reluctantly relaxes his hold. "No, Danny, you're not broken. Not like Anton and Victor were. Not by a long shot."

"But I _feel_ broken," Danny says.

"You're not broken, Danny," Steve repeats. "You're brave, and strong, and -"

"If someone told me, no, I would stop," Danny says with conviction.

"Yes, you would," Steve says, nodding, and massaging Danny's scalp.

"If someone told me, no, and that they didn't like the way I touched them, I would stop," Danny says. He's squeezing Steve hard, arms wrapped all the way around the man. "I would."

"I know you would, Danny," Steve says. "I know you would, buddy. I'm sorry that Anton didn't listen to you. What happened wasn't your fault. It was Anton's fault."

"But, he was broken," Danny says. "Maybe...maybe he didn't know it was wrong."

Sighing, Steve resists the urge to curse aloud. He knew that he'd fucked things up as soon as the words had left his mouth. Danny is, above all else, a compassionate child. More compassionate than he should be, and Steve will not have Danny feeling compassion, or remorse, for Anton. Not after what the man did to him.

"Danny, broken or not, what Anton did was wrong, and he knew it was wrong," Steve says. "You told him, no, and he didn't listen. _He_ was wrong. Just because someone is broken does not mean that they get to do wrong things to other people. Do you understand?"

Danny's face scrunches up as he thinks about Steve's words, and he loosens his hold a little on Steve, fingers still clutching the folds of Steve's pajama shirt tightly.

"Just because Anton was broken doesn't mean that it was okay for him to try to break me, too," Danny says, voice quiet and solemn.

"It wasn't okay," Steve says.

"And I'm not broken," Danny says.

"No, you're not," Steve agrees.

Danny eventually falls back to sleep, hugging Steve to himself, like a teddy bear, listening to Steve's heartbeat, something that Danny confided in Steve that he liked to do, because it sounded nice, and safe, and his words of reassurance until Steve's certain that the boy understands that he'd done nothing wrong, that Anton, even though he was broken, did not have a right to hurt him the way that he'd hurt Danny.

It's a victory of sorts. A breakthrough. Usually Danny doesn't fall back to sleep after a nightmare. Steve should probably get some more sleep, too, but he's still thinking through what he'd said to Danny, and wondering what Dr. Bergman will say when he tells him about it before Danny's next session with him.

The weeks leading up to Thanksgiving are filled with more victories than setbacks, which is an upward trend that Dr. Bergman seems hopeful about. Steve is waiting for the other shoe to drop, and doesn't trust the change in trends. He knows that things could easily swing back in the opposite direction.

Still, Steve doesn't balk when Aunt Deb suggests that he have a Thanksgiving gathering for Danny, and invite the people that he works with.

Aunt Deb thinks they're contractors, and that they manage a company that deals with contracting out work for construction and engineering. She has no idea that the contractor part of the job is correct, it's just a different kind of contract that they fulfill.

Thanksgiving Day dawns early. It's gray and cool, drizzling rain, but Danny's excited about the party, about eating turkey, and pie, and seeing his aunts and uncles. He hasn't been excited in months.

Steve is waiting for a flashback, or for Danny to have a fit of anger. Waiting for something to happen that will necessitate calling off the whole affair.

Nothing happens. Danny's still excited, and talking a mile a minute, like he used to, before the Hesse brothers took him.

When Aunt Deb comes mid-morning to help with the turkey, and stuffing - the others are bringing side dishes, and desserts - Danny's practically vibrating with energy. His dog, Stitch, is buzzing with the same energy, and Steve sends the dog outside to burn some of it off, so that the dog isn't constantly underfoot. Danny stays safely inside, within Steve, and Aunt Deb's orbit. He doesn't venture out on his own like he used to.

The day continues to get better as it progresses. The weather clears up well enough to allow for swimming, and everyone works up an appetite. The food is good. The company is even better, and still, Steve has a hard time letting go of that other shoe he fears is going to drop.

Steve knows that he has a lot to be thankful for this year. Looking around his lanai, at all of the people gathered there - Chin, and his wife, Malia; Kono, and her fiance, Adam; his Aunt Deb; Kamekona; Toast; their new man, Lou, and his family; and Danny, the light of his life - he realizes that this is what 'ohana is, and his heart swells.

Danny's sitting on Chin's lap, Stitch, is lying obediently beside the pair, tail thumping every once in awhile. Whatever story Chin is telling him has the little boy shooting looks of disbelief at his 'uncle' and giggling into his hand, shoulders hunched and shaking. He's at ease, back against Chin's chest, relaxed, head tucked beneath his uncle's chin. It's a sight to behold, and Steve holds his breath for a few seconds as he tries to capture this moment and hold onto it forever.

Kono's much more practical. She raises her eyebrows when she catches Steve watching Danny, Chin, Malia, and the dog, from the post (in a corner of the lanai) that he's propped up against, and slips her phone out of her pocket. She snaps a series of photos, and deftly shares them with Steve's phone. She gives him a wink, and then turns her attention toward the trio, mouth going soft around the edges. She senses the change in the air, too. Danny's happy. It shouldn't be remarkable. A year ago, it wouldn't have been.

Danny's come a long way in the last few months. There was a time when Steve had thought that Danny would never laugh again, that he'd never let another man touch him the way that Chin is touching him now, that Danny would never smile, or talk, or play, or do any of the things that had made him unique.

There was a time, not too long ago, that Steve had feared that the Hesse brothers had forever stolen every bit of happiness from Danny. Seeing Danny tonight, interacting with the people who have somehow become Steve, and Danny's, extended family, Steve has hope.

Things still aren't perfect - Danny has terrible nightmares, and flashbacks; there are times when he won't let Steve near him, and times when Danny won't let go of him - and Steve knows that things will probably never be 'perfect', but he has hope that they _will_ be better, that _Danny_ will get better, even if moments like these - free of evidence of the trauma that Danny has suffered - make him feel ill at ease. He's been on edge for so long, Steve's not sure how to turn that feeling of walking on eggshells off.

Dr. Bergman, Danny's psychologist, assures Steve that Danny's making progress, and that, sometimes, to go forward, he may have to take a few steps backward. It's perfectly normal, and to be expected.

Steve hates the days that they go backward. Those days, his blood runs cold, and he wishes that he could resurrect the Hesse brothers just so that he could hang them upside down with barbed wire from the rafters of some old, abandoned mill, gut them with a hunting knife, and watch their insides fall out, watch them bleed out like the pigs that they were. He wants to bring them back to life so that he can kill them with his bare hands.

Sometimes, when Danny's screaming and begging, his voice growing hoarse from saying, _'Please no, please, please, I'll be good, please stop, I'll be good, stop, please stop, no...'_ Steve entertains thoughts of having the Hesse brothers at his mercy. Of taking his prized driver and beating Anton with it until the man is little more than a pulpy mess of quivering goo, and then shoving it so far up Anton's ass that the dead man can taste the iron of the golf club, and choke to death on his own blood. He'd make Victor watch, and then scoop the man's eyeballs out with a serrated grapefruit spoon. He'd let the man live a little while, blind, the last image that he sees of his brother being that of Anton's gruesome death, and then he'd kill Victor slowly, starving and bleeding him dry for months.

Other times, when Danny's back to hiding in his closet, clothes and toys piled around him so that all that Steve can see of the little boy is a blonde tuft of hair, Steve imagines taking the Hesses to this place in Thailand where he knows a man who specializes in torture, and watching while the man takes them apart one patch of skin, one piece of flesh, at a time, until there's nothing left of them but bloody bones, easily gotten rid of with lye.

And when Danny wakes at night, whimpering, too terrified to scream, or move, Steve wants nothing more than to visit the Hesses' graves, dig them up and piss on their bones.

He feels so damn impotent on days when Danny seems to be going backward. He hadn't been there for Danny when the boy had needed him the most. He'd failed him, and the consequences of his failure had been dire. Danny'd been hurt in ways that Steve could not bear to think about, but did, because hiding away from the truth would not do either of them any good.

The days when Danny shies away from Steve, whispering that Steve's dead, that he can't be real, that he's a ghost, Steve wants to drag the Hesses up from depths of Hell and show them the true meaning of the word. The devil's torture of the brothers would no doubt pale by comparison with Steve's. The devil doesn't care about Danny, has no need to exact revenge on the brothers. Steve does. Vengeance is a cold-hearted bitch in heat, and she's after blood.

Steve shakes himself from thoughts of revenge, forces himself to focus on the here and now. It's a good day. A step forward, not backward, in Danny's recovery, and Steve doesn't want to color it with thoughts of the men who'd hurt the little boy, even if he feels like he's on shaky ground, like the floor will drop out on him at any minute, and Danny will lose the ground that he's gained in his recovery.

He takes a sip of his beer; it's gone warm, and a little flat. He watches Danny with Chin and Malia. The little boy is smiling, one hand hanging down toward Stitch, fingers running through the dog's soft fur. Malia is sitting at the foot of the beach lounge chair that Chin and Danny are huddled together on, her hand resting on Danny's bare foot, thumb stroking the arch.

It's an intimate family moment, and Steve's heart twists in his chest. He feels like an intruder, and an outsider.

"She's going to be a wonderful mother," Lou says, nodding toward Malia.

She's seven months pregnant, and in the light of the tiki torches that surround Steve's lanai, she's glowing. Steve's glad that he'd finally agreed to Chin and Kono's proposal to add another man to the team (Lou's very good at what he does, and he fits in well with the team's dynamics), and to start up a front business - inter-island helicopter flights, and contracting for small construction jobs. He wonders if the Hesses would have taken Danny if he'd have agreed to their plan earlier, but dismisses that thought as irrelevant. What ifs aren't going to turn back time and fix Danny.

Steve swallows another sip of beer, and grimaces at the stale taste of it. Lou hands him a fresh beer, and they clink bottles.

"Yeah," Steve agrees, the word sticking in his throat. "She'll be great."

 _She's already better parent than I am,_ Steve thinks. _Chin is, too. They're naturals._ Steve is still struggling with the simple stuff. He's in Parenting 101, and Chin and Malia seem to be somewhere in the 200s.

He turns his gaze toward Lou's family. The man's wife is chatting with Kono, Adam, and Steve's Aunt Deb. Lou's son and daughter are playing some card game with Toast and Kamekona. It looks to be very engaging, if not more than a little odd. Steve doesn't know of any card games that require players to squawk, and move their arms like a chicken, and he's not sure if it's something that someone who has lost a card, or gained a card, has to do in the game that he's not quite watching.

"How do you do it?" Steve asks. "How do you -"

"Do what we do and raise my kids to be happy, well-rounded individuals?" Lou finishes Steve's question.

Steve takes a sip of his beer, and nods. He's looking at Danny. The little boy is saying something to Malia and Chin, the hand that's not petting Stitch is moving, fast as lightning, as he talks. Danny's more animated than he has been in weeks, and Steve almost chokes on his beer. It feels like he's swallowing glass, but he masks it by taking another drink. The beer tastes like dirt, and it sits heavily in his stomach.

"Renee has a lot to do with how happy my kids are. She's a wonderful wife and mother. There are days that I don't know what I'd do without her," Lou confesses.

"She's a beautiful woman," Steve says.

He thinks about Catherine. About bringing her into the life that he lives; into Danny's life, and asking her to be a wife and mother. He knows that it wouldn't work out the way that it has for Lou.

"You think Danny'd be better off with someone else," Lou guesses correctly. He nudges Steve with an elbow, and points toward the three with the neck of his beer.

"I'm no good for him," Steve admits quietly. "If -"

"If wishes were horses, we'd be shoveling a ton of shit," Lou says, purposefully bastardizing the saying.

Steve shakes his head, a reluctant smile pulls at the corner of his mouth, and he takes a sip of his beer. It doesn't sit as heavily in his stomach as his last sip did.

Lou's a good man to work with, and a good man to have as a friend. He's great at getting information out of a man, and most times he doesn't even need to use torture to do it. He's patient, and knows how to wait someone out, how to prey on their greatest weaknesses, and how to play on their greatest strengths. He knows how to break a man down, and then bring him back up. And right now, Steve knows that's what the man is doing with him, breaking him down. He's thankful that the man is on his side, and not on the side of the law, or one of Steve's many enemies.

"You wanna know what I see when I look at Danny right now?" Lou asks, settling in next to Steve, leaning against the post until their shoulders are touching.

Steve grunts. He knows what _he_ sees: _Danny having fun, and being more open and trusting than he has been since Steve recovered him from the Hesses, with Chin and Malia, not him. He sees a family. He sees what it is that Danny deserves to have, and what Steve can never give him. A father and a mother who know how to tell stories, and laugh, and entertain a little boy without breaking out into a cold sweat, or having to consult a child psychologist, or a how to parent for dummies manual. He sees what Danny's life might have been like if Steve had never come into it. He sees a past, and a future for Danny without himself in it._

"I see a little boy who, in spite of everything that he's been through, is thriving, because he has a man, a father, who, even though he doesn't know what the hell he's doing half the time, and none of us do, Steve, is doing everything in his power to make sure that he's safe, and that he's cared for, and loved," Lou says.

He has a faraway look in his eyes, and they go soft when his gaze lands on his wife, who is laughing at something that Kono's said.

"That's all any of us can do," Lou says. "Love them, protect them when we can, and pick them up when they fall down. And they will fall down, again, and again, and it hurts," Lou rubs at his chest, emphasizing his point, "like nothing else does. When _they_ get hurt, _we_ hurt."

"What if you're the cause of that hurt?" Steve asks.

Lou knows most of Danny's story. Knows that Danny's not Steve's, and that Danny was kidnapped shortly before Lou had been hired by Chin and Kono to take up the slack when Steve had to take time off to be with Danny.

Lou had first met Danny when the boy had been scared of his own shadow, and hadn't even batted an eyelash. Danny's warmed up to Lou since then, but he's much more reserved than he would have been had the man met him prior to his abduction. It pains Steve that Danny's changed so much because of what happened to him.

Lou reaches over and squeezes Steve's shoulder. "When you're a father, it seems like half the time you're the cause of the hurt that your child is going through, intentional or not. And, when you do what _we_ do for a living," Lou stops and takes a deep breath, he looks over at his children, his daughter is hopping around on one foot, making some kind of barnyard animal sound as she places a card, face up, in the center of the playing area.

"Well, when you do what we do for a living, sometimes the hurt you cause is deliberate, and necessary, but it's a hurt that, in the end, will protect them. Like last week when I had to miss my baby girl's school play to kill a man. Did you know she had a starring role?"

Steve shakes his head. He remembers how intent Lou had been on making that kill himself. He'd been colder than Steve had ever seen him, making the already formidable man even more of a force to be reckoned with.

It wasn't one of their typical hits, and, looking back, Steve's not sure they should have taken it on, even though he knows that there was no way that they'd have turned it down. Not after bringing Lou onto their team. Not after Danny's time with the Hesses.

The father of a girl, same age as Lou's daughter, Samantha, hired them to kill the man who'd beaten and raped his little girl. She'd been in a coma for several months before the man had finally been able to find his way to the black market and make the proper connections with members of the underworld who could introduce him to Steve's crew.

The man had been unable to pay even a third of their usual retainer, but the team took the job anyway, not particularly concerned with whether or not the man would be able to follow through with the rest of their pay when the job was done, though he'd promised them that he would be good for it. That he had something in the works.

The rapist had gotten away with the rape because he was wealthy and had 'diplomatic immunity'. There was evidence that he'd raped other little girls, all within a certain age range, and had never once been reprimanded for it, let alone prosecuted. He'd been able to pay off the families of the other little girls with a large amount of hush money. The man who hired Steve's team used the hush money to pay them after they'd killed the man for him. He'd refused to keep a penny of it.

It must have made the man's stomach churn to take that money, and walk away from the asshole who'd taken his child's innocence, and put her in a coma. Steve knows, firsthand, what the father will face once his little girl wakes up - _if she wakes up_ \- and he almost hopes, for the girl's, and for the father's, sake that she doesn't wake up from her coma. That she passes away peacefully, without the pain of remembering what had happened to her.

"The thought of that monster getting his hands on my baby girl, and doing to her what he'd done to those other girls...I couldn't stomach it," Lou says, voice harsh and low. "Samantha's mad at me. Says that I don't care about her, or love her, that I work too much, and don't ever come to any of her school things. Eventually, she'll get over it, sooner if she needs something, or wants money for shopping."

"It's not the same," Steve says.

"The hell it isn't," Lou counters. "You love that little boy, I can see it every time you look at him, or when you talk about him. I'd bet you'd do anything to protect him. _Anything_ ," Lou emphasizes his words by jabbing a finger at Steve's chest.

"It don't matter how Danny came into your life, and I'm not saying that taking him was right, because you and I both know that it wasn't," Lou says.

Steve grunts in acknowledgement and takes a swig of his beer. It's lukewarm, and bitter. Out of the corner of his eye Steve can see that Danny's lying beside Chin now, head resting on the man's chest. His eyes are starting to droop, and the little boy stifles a yawn. Steve will have to carry the boy up to his room before long, wrangle him out of his swim trunks, and into his pajamas. He can give Danny a bath in the morning.

"What I _am_ saying is that Danny's in your life now, and _you_ are the only father he's got. It's not Chin that Danny looks to when he's scared. It's not Malia the boy goes to when he has a nightmare, or when he can't stop seeing those monsters who took him. It's _you_ that Danny goes to when he's hurting, and when he needs what only his father can give him," Lou says.

He looks from his wife, to his children. His son, Will, is quacking like a duck and walking around the players, pretending to peck at them. Kamekona lays a card, face-down, in the center of the playing area, and Will picks it up with his teeth.

"Being a father is the hardest, worst, best thing that you'll ever do with your life," Lou says, chuckling and shaking his head at the antics of the card players. "There'll be days when Danny will get on your last nerve, and you'll wonder why the hell you decided to do any of this. And then there'll be days like this that makes it all - ups, downs, and in-betweens - worthwhile."

Lou gestures toward the others, and Steve follows the sweep of his arm to where Kono, Adam, Aunt Deb, and Renee are talking expressively about something that Steve can't quite make out; to Will, Samantha, Kamekona, and Toast playing the strangest game he's ever seen; to Chin and Malia, reclined side-by-side, heads bent together, fingers twined as they whisper to each other, while Danny sleeps, sprawled out on Chin.

"These, Steve, are the days that fathers live for, regardless of what they do for a living, or what might happen the next day," Lou says, and, after squeezing Steve's shoulder one last time, he makes his way over to his wife, leaving Steve to deal with the remainder of his beer, and his thoughts.

Steve chugs the rest of his beer and tosses the bottle into the recycling container. He doesn't reach for another beer. His idea of celebrating no longer includes getting hammered, or getting higher than a kite.

Danny's face scrunches, and his brow wrinkles. The hand that he's got on Stitch's head twitches, and the dog yawns as it stretches, and shakes itself awake. Stitch licks Danny's hand, and the boy pulls it away, tucks it to his chest. Danny's breath hitches.

Chin and Malia are unaware of the slight change in the pattern of Danny's breathing, though Steve's hyper aware of it, and hopes that it's not the prelude to a nightmare, especially not after Danny's had such a great day.

 _It's supposed to be two steps forward, and one step back,_ Steve thinks. _Not one step forward, and three steps back._

Steve makes his way over to the trio, trying for casual, and failing if the look that Lou casts in his direction is anything to go by. His heart is in his throat when he reaches Chin, Malia and Danny.

Stitch's tail thumps twice, and the dog looks up at Steve and yawns. He looks over to Danny, and then back at Steve, and nudges Steve's shin with his cool, wet nose. His intention is clear - _pick up the boy; it's time for bed._ Steve wonders how he'd gotten to this point in life, where a little boy, and his dog, can boss him around. Kono would say that he's whipped, and she'd be right.

Steve kneels down beside the lounge chair, and taps Chin's shoulder to get his attention. The man is so focused on his wife that Steve doubts he'd even heard Steve approach. Steve can't really blame him for that. Malia's beautiful.

"I'll get him out of your hair," Steve whispers, motioning toward Danny.

"He's no trouble," Chin says, just as quietly, inadvertently tightening his hold on the little boy.

"I should get him upstairs, into bed," Steve says. "He'll sleep better there."

Danny's Ironman nightlight and curtains help the boy feel safe. Having Stitch sleeping in a tight, not so little ball at the end of his bed, or lying alongside him, taking up half the bed, will help, too.

Chin nods, and Malia reaches over to run her fingers through Danny's hair. The little boy sighs in his sleep, breath evening out once more, and leans into the touch.

"He's such a sweet little boy," Malia says, face clouding over briefly before she smiles again. "You're lucky to have him."

She doesn't know that Danny's not Steve's. She doesn't know what Chin, or any of them, do for a living. Steve wonders if Chin will tell her someday, or if he'll keep her in the dark, like Lou has his own family.

She does know about the kidnapping. She'd been a steady, calming presence while the team had searched for the little boy. She'd been at the hospital when Steve had brought Danny in after he'd gotten him back, and had helped keep the boy calm for his examination, and the treatment of his injuries. Steve had never heard her swear before, or since, that day.

"I am," Steve agrees, smiling. The tightness that had wound itself around his chest is gone, disbanding sometime between his walk over to the lounge, and this moment.

Malia and Chin kiss Danny's forehead, and Steve shifts him out of Chin's arms and into his. Steve waves quiet good-nights on the boy's behalf, and then makes his way into the house, and up the stairs to Danny's room.

Danny's limbs are heavy in sleep, and Steve's grateful that he doesn't have to attempt to remove a tee-shirt. The swim trunks come off easily enough, and Steve diverts his eyes away from the cigarette burns that pepper Danny's inner thighs. They'll fade some, with time, and with the scar cream that Malia had recommended he use. Right now, though, seeing them only makes Steve want to kill men who are already dead.

Steve dresses Danny in a pair of boxers, and the bottoms of his favorite Superman PJs. He doesn't even want to attempt to put the PJ top on Danny. In sleep, Danny can be combative if he's moved around too much. He'd been that way before the Hesses had taken him, which is a minor comfort.

It's a mildly cool night, but Danny always runs a little hot when he sleeps, and, no matter how few bedclothes he has on the bed at the start of the night, almost half of them end up balled up at the end of the bed, or lying on the floor anyway.

Steve tucks Danny in, making sure that the Avenger sheets, red blanket, and Avengers comforter are wrapped around him snugly.

Stitch waits patiently for Steve to finish what he's doing before jumping onto the bed and sniffing around for a good spot to sleep. Tonight, it's right next to Danny, by the boy's right calf. Stitch turns in a full circle, pawing at the comforter that Steve's just put into place, making a nest of sorts, and then, after making another full circle in the opposite direction, he settles down, and curls himself into a ball. Sometimes Steve wonders if the dog is half cat.

He debates on which stuffed animal to place next to the boy - the stuffed tiger that he'd gotten when he'd visited the zoo with Aunt Deb...it feels like years ago; or the 'celiraptor' he'd gotten for Easter, also ages ago - and ends up putting the beloved 'celiraptor' on Danny's chest, and Tiger right beside him, just in case it turns out to be a two stuffed animals kind of night.

Steve brushes the boy's bangs off his forehead, and Danny sighs, like he had with Malia. His lips twitch upward into a smile, and he turns onto his side, toward Steve, pulling his arms free of Steve's tucking job, and wrapping them around the stuffed dinosaur.

Danny's bangs are getting long, losing some of the curl that seems to be natural in Danny's hair. He'll have to bribe Danny into getting a haircut before it grows too long. Danny hates haircuts, and won't sit still for them for longer than a few minutes at a time.

Danny shifts in his sleep, and Stitch makes a disgruntled, half-growl, half-moan, sound, and pops his head up. He blinks at Steve, yawns, and then sighs and pulls his head back into the circle of his body with his paws.

Steve holds his breath when Danny mumbles something indistinct in his sleep, waits to see if Danny's face crumbles, or if his body stiffens like it does when Danny's trapped in a nightmare.

After a few seconds of hearing nothing but soft snores, and incoherent mumbles that don't sound anything like what Danny says when he's scared, Steve lets out the breath that he'd been holding, and dares to allow himself to believe that this will be a good night, just like it was a good day, for Danny. That he won't have to book an extra session for Danny with Dr. Bergman this week.

Danny's down to two sessions a week now. He's been seeing the child psychologist for several months.

At first, Dr. Bergman had asked to see Danny for short sessions every weekday, then he'd made the sessions a little longer, and had Danny come every other day; now Danny's down to just two days a week, unless he has a setback, and needs to see the psychologist immediately (which has only happened a couple of times).

Though the man's methods are somewhat unorthodox, and the man himself is a bit odd, he's helped both Danny, and Steve deal with what had happened during the kidnapping, and its aftermath: Sleepless nights. Panic attacks. Flashbacks. Nightmares. Out of control temper tantrums. Wetting the bed, or accidentally wetting himself. Self-harm - Steve had come home one day to find Aunt Deb trying to pull Danny away from the wall. He was rocking back and forth, banging his head into the wall with ever increasing force. It was a nightmare.

Danny mumbles again, and his lips twitch, and then he giggles, quietly, snorting like he sometimes does when he's laughing and isn't self-conscious about it. He mumbles, and this time Steve _can_ make out some of the words, but they don't make much sense: _"Peanut butter, jelly beans, sailor..."_

Danny clutches his stuffed dinosaur more tightly, hugging it. His breath evens out again as whatever dream had come to the surface fades into the background, and Steve watches Danny's chest rise and fall, marveling at the miracle of it.

"Steve?" Aunt Deb whispers from the doorway before entering the room. "Is everything alright?"

"No nightmares," Steve whispers back. "You heading out?"

Aunt Deb drops a kiss on Steve's, and then Danny's, forehead, and nods. "It's getting late, and I've got an early day tomorrow. I'm meeting some friends for breakfast."

"Thank you for tonight," Steve says. "I can't remember the last time that I've had Thanksgiving dinner."

"You're welcome, Steven," Aunt Deb says. "I don't think you've had a lot to be thankful for until Danny came into your life."

"No, I don't suppose I have," Steve says, knowing it to be true. Danny's still smiling in his sleep, the dinosaur held to himself in a very firm grip, and Steve doesn't think his heart could be any fuller than it is at this moment. Though that shoe is still up in the air, ready to drop, Steve doesn't think it will drop tonight.

"Danny's brought a lot of light, and love, into all of our lives. Hopefully we can do the same for him. He deserves it."

Nodding, Steve traces Danny's face with his fingers. It's something that both Danny, and he, finds comforting. "I'm trying," Steve says.

"I know you are." Aunt Deb places another kiss on his head. "That's the only thing that any parent can do - _try_. Some of the best families are the ones that we make ourselves. Those people that you work with, they're good people, and they feel like family. Let them help you and Danny."

Aunt Deb runs her fingers through Danny's hair, and whispers something into the boy's ear, and then, smiling at Steve, she leaves.

Steve isn't sure how long he sits beside Danny, just watching the boy sleep, wondering what it is that he's dreaming, happy that it isn't a nightmare, before he presses a kiss to the top of Danny's head, and reluctantly rises to leave. He brushes a hand over Stitch's fur, and gets an unhappy groan from the dog. He smiles.

Making sure that the door is open wide enough to admit himself should Danny need him later that night, Steve heads back downstairs to wish his guests a final Happy Thanksgiving, and see them off to their respective homes. Steve has a lot to be thankful for this year, not the least of which is Danny, and his team, his 'ohana.


End file.
